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In a nine-day jury trial, Schuyler Roche’s Charles Cole successfully defended an emergency room doctor and physician’s assistant charged with medical malpractice, exonerating both from any liability in the death of a 70-year-old man whom paramedics had rushed to the hospital after an unwitnessed fall. He died two weeks later. Following a suit brought by his wife and adult children, the attorney for the plaintiffs argued that Schuyler Roche’s clients had failed to treat the patient’s head trauma expediently.
Mindful of the family’s grief, Cole sought to establish that all procedures following admittance were reasonable and correct when considering the patient’s signs and symptoms. During triage, for example, the patient could not recall whether a fall had caused his head wound or whether an injury had led to his fall, a situation that complicated the diagnostic process.
“Under the circumstances, my clients proceeded logically in treating this gentleman,” says Cole, “drawing blood, x-raying the cervical spine, conducting a CT scan of the head, calling for a neurosurgeon.” Ultimately, the jury agreed.
Richard Juarez, who handled a majority of the depositions and pretrial motions for Schuyler Roche, explains, “When a plaintiff and defendant provide different interpretations of the same set of facts, predicting the jury’s response is at best a fifty-fifty proposition. Naturally, the defendants and Chuck were pleased with the outcome of the trial.”
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