Recent Cases

STATE ORDERED TO PAY $8.5 MILLION IN CRASH KILLING FOUR

MOTORCYCLE/POLICE VEHICLE COLLISION-BUFFALO POLICE DEPARTMENT FOUND 100% NEGLIGENT-AWAITING TRIAL IN WRONGFUL DEATH DAMAGES FOR SURVING FAMILY

CRASH INJURIES LEAD TO $3.3 MILLION JURY AWARD

OLEAN TEEN TO GET $2.2 MILLION FOR INJURY

INJURED WOMAN ACCEPTS $2.1 MILLION SETTLEMENT

ENGINEER LEFT BLIND IN ONE EYE ACCEPTS $1.35 MILLION SETTLEMENT

STATE ORDERED TO PAY $8.5 MILLION IN CRASH KILLING FOUR

The State has been ordered to pay $8.5 million to the three surviving children of an Amherst couple killed with their two children in a crash on the Thruway in Lancaster. A New York State Supreme Court Judge found the New York State Thruway's failure to inspect and maintain a portion of the toll road near Lancaster to be 100% responsible. The judge ruled that officials knew about and failed to repair the roadway. The accident claimed the mother, father, and two of the four children traveling in the car.

MOTORCYCLE/POLICE VEHICLE COLLISION-BUFFALO POLICE DEPARTMENT FOUND 100% NEGLIGENT-AWAITING TRIAL IN WRONGFUL DEATH DAMAGES FOR SURVING FAMILY

An off-duty Buffalo firefighter and his passenger were killed in a spectacular collision on Route 33/Kensington Expressway when an on-duty Buffalo police officer wrongfully pulled into the path of the victims motorcycle. The jury found the Buffalo police department 100% negligent in the accident.

CRASH INJURIES LEAD TO $3.3 MILLION JURY AWARD

A Portville teen has been awarded $3.3 million for severe head injuries she suffered in a back road car crash. The crash occurred on Cherry Hollow Road, jointly owned by the towns of Genesee and Portville. Francis M. Letro, the teen's attorney noted that the two towns had resurfaced the road three days before the crash and that signs were improperly posted warning of the oil and gravel-filled roadway. The driver lost control of the car on a curve and the car rolled, its roof slamming into a telephone pole after ejecting the teen, who landed 10 feet away. She was in a coma for four weeks in Erie County Medical Center.

OLEAN TEEN TO GET $2.2 MILLION FOR INJURY

The family of a young woman from Allegany who was blinded in one eye after surgery by a former Olean doctor has accepted a $2.2 million settlement. The teenager had sought treatment for a sty in her right eye. The procedure the doctor performed under local anesthesia left the teen blind in her right eye. Mr. Letro claimed that the doctor "was negligent in perforating the eyeball of the patient with a hypodermic syringe while attempting to administer a local injection of anesthesia in the child's right upper eyelid." The doctor has since had his license to practice in New York revoked by the State Health Department.

INJURED WOMAN ACCEPTS $2.1 MILLION SETTLEMENT

A Franklinville woman, severely injured in a lunchtime traffic accident in Olean, has accepted a $2.1 million cash settlement. The settlement by the Franklinville woman, 43, came during the second week of her negligence trial against Stroehman's Bakery of Olean and one of its drivers. Letro said his client, an instructional aide at an Allegany rehabilitation center, was driving east on West State Street in Olean when a Stroehman bakery truck driver made an unsafe left turn into the path of her vehicle.

ENGINEER LEFT BLIND IN ONE EYE ACCEPTS $1.35 MILLION SETTLEMENT

A Great Valley mechanical engineer left blind in his right eye by an Olean eye surgeon, has accepted a $1.35 million medical insurance settlement. Mr. Letro's 62-year old client went to the eye surgeon for a routine eye checkup and was told he needed immediate cataract surgery. The botched surgery forced Mr. Letro's client into early retirement.