Illinois Lawyer Blog

Just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse, there was some absolutely jaw-dropping testimony yesterday in a clergy sex abuse case trial currently underway in St. Clair County, Illinois. James Wisniewski, 47, is suing the Belleville, Illinois Diocese for for damages arising out of the years of sexual abuse committed upon him by Rev. Raymond Kownacki… Read More

Check out the August issue of the Illinois Bar Journal for a good article by April Pruitt-Summers on the Illinois Animal Control Act, 510 ILCS 5/1 et. seq. The first thing that caught my eye was the link to a study conducted by pediatrician Jeffrey Sacks M.D. and reported in PEDIATRICS[Vol. 97, No. 6, ppss. 891-95]. The link contains some pretty sobering stati… Read More

Recently completed a case where my client was involved in a rear end collision with a large truck on a local highway. The case was tried to a judge and at the conclusion of my case the defense, as they always do, argued for a directed verdict. What I did not know at the time[but do now]is that the standard for a directed verdict motion in a bench trial is some… Read More

Another entry from the Truth is Stranger than Fiction Department… A Chicago-area man is claiming that some undercooked fish he ate as a patron at Shaw’s Crabhouse had rather horrifying repercussions. Franz recently filed a lawsuit against Shaw’s and is claiming that as a result of eating the fish he became violently ill for several days. And… Read More

A Florida Federal District Court judge recently refused to dismiss the lawsuit that accuses CNN’s Nancy Grace of driving a young woman to commit suicide. The lawsuit, filed by the parents of Melinda Duckett, arises out of an appearance Ms. Duckett made on The Nancy Grace Show shortly after Duckett’s son, Trenton, went missing in August of 2006. The… Read More

Back from vacation, lots to catch up on… Salary.Com just released its annual study regarding the market value of a stay at home mom. Every year this group gets together and evaluates precisely what mom is worth, by looking at pay levels for the various jobs a mother may do during a given week, like housekeeping, child-care, van driver and teacher. This y… Read More

According to any number of recent reports, Crocs, the popular rubber shoe every kid seems to be wearing these days, may present a danger when worn on escalators. The report mentioned a recent situation involving a young girl injured at an airport. The girl[who was three at the time] and her mother were making their way through an airport on their way to a Disn… Read More

I am presently reading a book entitled Your Witness, which is essentially a compilation of cross-examination pointers collected from prominent Chicago lawyers. [In the interest of full disclosure, the book was sent to me, in the hopes I would mention it on my blog]. Having said that, I have thus far greatly enjoyed most of it, in part because I happen to know… Read More