Sometimes even New Jersey and Pennsylvania can benefit from the safety lessons learned in the rest of the world.

It turns out that, in some nations, it’s quite common for drivers to mount cheap video cameras to face forward on their vehicles’ dashboards. The intention: to capture a video record of the trip from the driver’s perspective.

People in the United States became aware of this custom in February 2013, when a number of car cameras captured the spectacular fall of a meteorite in the vicinity of Chelyabinsk, Russia. Of course, Russian citizens don’t invest in “dash cams” in the hope of capturing rare astronomical events. Instead, the cameras are used to document traffic accidents and police misbehavior. Video evidence from the cameras is often used in Russian courts.

Can dash cams help against New Jersey traffic accidents?

This has led some policymakers to suggest that American roads would be safer if more vehicles were equipped with dash cams. They reason that having a record of a traffic accident would improve the administration of justice in both criminal and civil courts. The video evidence could help demonstrate, for example, that a criminal defendant was driving while intoxicated or that a New Jersey auto collision was caused by a speeding SUV. Once drivers realize they would be held accountable for their misbehavior on highways, they would begin driving with more attention to safety.

Other experts aren’t so sure. Scott Diamond, a personal injury lawyer who works with clients injured in Pennsylvania and New Jersey vehicle accidents, recently expressed skepticism in a news interview. Mr. Diamond is quick to point out that car accidents in New Jersey are complex events. Even when only two vehicles collide, the accident may affect the maneuvers of a dozen other vehicles. Only careful analysis of a car crash by skillful investigators can figure out what actually went on.

Can a dashboard-mounted camera capture all these nuances? “I would say it’s very helpful but it’s not conclusive evidence,” said Mr. Diamond. “It could be misleading if not in the right hands.”

Choose an attorney with the right investigative skills

Don’t expect Americans to rush out and buy dash cams. Camera evidence has not been accepted as the ultimate truth in court; at best, it provides useful but not compelling evidence. And even pro-camera advocates admit that public attitudes won’t change to encourage road safety until cameras are used much more widely.

For now, we will continue to rely on the standard tools that a New Jersey auto injury attorney brings to the courtroom: keen intelligence, a mastery of the law, and superior investigative talent. These skills are why New Jersey and Pennsylvania residents injured in traffic accidents have come to rely on attorney Scott Diamond. Contact his office at 800-348-2680 today to schedule a free consultation if you have been injured in a New Jersey highway accident or Pennsylvania Turnpike crash. There is no charge for legal fees unless Scott can win a damage award or secure a settlement for your case.

It’s long been known that large tractor-trailer trucker pose a significant danger on the road. Experts in vehicle design have even taken that into account. Now a new report says those big-rig truck safety features are failing to do the job.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety recently studied a particular class of collisions, in which tractor-trailer trucks are struck from the rear by passenger cars. Of particular concern are so-called “underride” accidents, where the front portion of the car drives under the truck’s trailer. This type of collision shatters the car’s windshield and crushes the upper space of the passenger compartment until the car comes to a stop.

Modern automobiles are designed so the front part of the vehicle will crumple on impact, absorbing a lot of the energy from a collision. That energy would otherwise be transmitted to harm the car’s occupants. In an underride accident, though, the front of the car slides beneath the truck, bypassing this safety design and inflicting maximum damage on the passenger compartment. The result is horrific injuries, including decapitation.

Is it worth $20 to save a life?

When the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) analyzed tractor-trailer truck collisions, their researchers found that special safety design features—adopted years ago to prevent underride incidents—were only effective when a car collided with the central rear area of the trailer. When cars struck further toward the rear edge of the trailer, these underride guards often did not prevent underride accidents and catastrophic injuries to the car’s occupants.

One bright spot in the findings: remounting the vertical supports for the underride guards can improve their effectiveness for a wider variety of car-truck collision accidents. Some trucking companies have already made those modifications to meet Canada’s more rigorous trailer regulations. But, in general, truckers who operate vehicles in the United States have not bothered to go beyond what U.S. law requires, even though the modification would only cost about $20 per vehicle.

Why are trucking companies unwilling to spend even a tiny amount to improve public safety? Perhaps it’s because any spur to reform would be driven by lawsuits, and current testing methods don’t provide good evidence for civil cases. New Jersey traffic injury attorney Scott Diamond reflected on how the defendant’s lawyers explain the typical incident to a jury as a car that’s been following too closely behind a truck. The car driver is portrayed as driving recklessly, and “It’s kind of hard to blame someone else for your fault,” Diamond told reporters recently.

Needed: a reliable way to hold dangerous truckers accountable

As long as the trucking industry isn’t called to account for the injuries from New Jersey big rig collisions, there is no incentive to make even $20 upgrades to make vehicles safer.

The idea that commercial trucks and their drivers are blameless in highway collisions is, of course, absurd. The IIHS had to design a standard testing environment for underride crashes, and that involved a nonmoving trailer and a car traveling at 35 miles per hour. That’s not actually how things work in the real world. Trucking underride collisions can also be caused by:

• Trucks suddenly swerving or changing lanes.
• Trucks stalling or braking unexpectedly.
• Trucks backing up at high speed from a parked position.

Underride collisions are rare. But commercial truck accidents in New Jersey and Pennsylvania are, unfortunately, all too common. If you have been injured in a New Jersey or Pennsylvania truck accident, contact Scott Diamond at 800-348-2680 today. Truck accident trial attorney Scott Diamond is ready to demand the settlement or jury award you deserve after your injuries caused by a truck driver’s negligence. Call today to schedule a free conference about your case and the financial recovery Mr. Diamond can seek for you,

After hours of labor, Enso Martinez cried as his wife, Rebecca Fielding was carried from their Waverly home on a stretcher en route to Johns Hopkins Hospital. Fielding, who had wanted to deliver her baby at home with the help of a midwife, assured her husband that everything would be OK. One thing she never expected was to wait over 2 hours in the ER for an emergency Caesarean section after being transported to the hospital by an ambulance.

The family says that if it didn’t take so much time for the doctors and nurses to perform the surgery that their son Enzo would be a normal 2 year old boy, instead the child is severely and permanently mentally and physically disabled.  their saga and evidence presented in their court case convinced a Baltimore Circuit Court jury to award them $55 million — one of the largest malpractice judgments in Maryland history, according to trial lawyers and legal experts. The jury awarded $25 million for future medical expenses and a life-care plan, $4 million for future lost wages, and $26 million for non-economic damages such as pain and suffering.

Martinez and Fielding argued the hospital and its parent, Johns Hopkins Health System Corp., also named in the civil lawsuit, were negligent in their care for Fielding and the couple’s then-unborn son. They contend their child’s cerebral palsy and seizure disorder was caused by a loss of oxygen to the brain while Fielding waited for the Caesarean section.

In 2011, 24 cases of significant birth injury were reported by hospitals, according to the state’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. That’s down from 30 cases in 2010, according to statistics.

Finding a good malpractice lawyer is detrimental to winning a big case. Making sure that the lawyer knows every aspect of the incident is crucial to having a good case. Be sure to keep this in mind when dealing with a malpractice lawsuit and contact Scott Diamond a personal injury attorney in Philadelphia for a free consultation.