Articles Posted in Wrongful Death

Pi Delta Psi, one of the country’s most popular Asian American fraternities, was formed nearly two decades ago around the ideals of the organization’s four pillars of character: academic achievement, cultural awareness, righteousness, and friendship/loyalty. None of those traits seemed to be on display earlier in December when the fraternity’s Baruch College chapter allegedly engaged 19-year-old freshman Chun Hsien Deng in a dangerous initiation “game” that rendered him unconscious, and then failed to bring him to the nearest hospital before an hour had passed, and Deng had lost all hope of survival.The game, called “Glass Ceiling,” involved having pledges like Deng carry backpacks filled with sand across a snowy yard, blindfolded, while fraternity brothers repeatedly tackled them. It is contended Deng was knocked unconscious by one of these impacts, and he remained unresponsive until he was declared dead at following day.The most disappointing fact about this story is how the fraternity brothers failed to seek medical attention for Deng immediately after his loss of consciousness. Instead they brought Deng inside, changed his clothes and ran Google searches for his symptoms. Even after decided that Deng needed more significant medical help than they could offer, the boys never called an ambulance for him. Rather they drove him toGeisinger Wyoming Valley Medical Center in a car, depriving him of yet more time in the care of trained professionals. When first confronted with the police, the brothers who accompanied Deng lied about his injuries, claiming that he had hit his head in a wrestling match.The only reasonable explanation for why these brothers would waste precious time seeking medical attention for a boy clearly suffering from major brain trauma is that they feared if the truth of their game was found out, they would be held liable for hazing.Hazing is an insidious crime particularly because it so often finds victims among impressionable freshman in college social groups such as fraternities. The law takes into account the peer pressure Deng must have felt when he agreed to partake in a game as dangerous as Glass Ceiling, by holding that the victim’s “consent to engage in a hazing activity is not a defense” against hazing.Fraternities and similar social organizations can be a greatly beneficial component of a college life. But they are still organizations run by students, and when they operate without constraint, and their own guidelines are forgotten, these groups can easily run amok. The tragedy of Chun Hsien Deng’s death is twofold: first, that before Deng’s head injury not one of the Pi Delta Psi brothers that were present stepped forward to put an end to this clearly dangerous game, and second, that after Deng was knocked unconscious, none of them feared for Deng’s survival more than they feared the consequences of being found responsible.

The limits of New York Court of Claims Judge Renee Forgensi Minarik’s authority were called into question last month in the hospital negligence lawsuit Thurston v. State. Minarik was forced to make a decision against her conscience but in accordance with an ancient law, the 1846 wrongful death statute that ignores the grief of loved ones in determining the damages in a wrongful death case. Justifying her decision, Minarik explained, “bad laws make hard cases.”Thurston v. State pitted the family of Cheryl Thurston, a physical and mentally handicapped woman who drowned in a bathtub at the state-run Office for People with Development Disabilities Pittsford facility as a result of her caretaker’s negligence, against the State of New York.Cheryl had a condition that caused her to suffer from frequent seizures, and as a result she required constant supervision from the facility’s staff. On August 30^th, 2008, Cheryl was left alone in her bathtub, where she experienced a seizure and then drowned before she was able to regain consciousness.The way that the present wrongful death statue is worded, because Cheryl was not earning income at the time of her death and because she was not conscious of her suffering, her case is not worth any pecuniary damages. Judge Minarik was forced by the law to dismiss Cheryl Thurston’s case, in the face of everything she knew to be just.”It is repugnant to the Court to have to enforce this law which places no intrinsic value on human life,” she wrote in her decision.Minarik’s authority would not allow her to award damages to the Thurston family or to punish the negligent facility for their flagrant error, but in her decision she acknowledged the need for significant legislative reform.Minarik’s sentiment is one that the New York State Trial Lawyers Association is in agreement with. Earlier this year they proposed an update to the 1846 wrongful death statue, which, they point out, predates the American Civil War and the abolition of slavery. Their proposal, dubbed Zachary’s Law after a two-year-old boy who was killed by the negligence of a hospital that was ultimately not held financially responsible, is an attempt to realign the law with modern ideas about the value of human life.Grief is real, and like physical pain and suffering it should have value in court. The negligent hospital that treated Zachary Storms understood the significance of grief. That’s why they paid for grief counseling for each of the hospital staff that was present for Zachary’s death. His parents, however, who stood by him and even held him down as instructed while doctors poured an exorbitant amount of activated charcoal solution down his throat, filling his stomach and lungs and eventually killing him, were not qualified to receive compensation for the grief they suffered and are still suffering.Because the present wrongful death statute awards damages based primarily on expected future income, it is highly biased towards high-income earners. The families of wealthy men and women are compensated more fully than middle and working class families. The lives of children and the elderly on the other hand, are nearly worthless in the eyes of the court because they are not earning income.This is a law that needs to be reformed, for Cheryl Thurston, For Zachary Storms, and for all the future victims of negligent institutions with little to no income.Sources: New York Law Journal, “Judge Forced to Make ‘Repugnant’ Decision,” June 4, 2013.New York State Trial Lawyer’s Association, “Shouldn’t New York’s grieving families be compesnsated for their profound loss?” 2013.