Central New York Injury Lawyer Blog

Syracuse NY Personal Injury Lawyer on Car Insurance

March 9, 2023 | by Michael Bersani

Hello blog readers! Today I’m blogging about car insurance. As a Syracuse and Central New York personal injury lawyer, this is something I know a lot about, and which I think many people need to learn more about.

Let’s start with the obvious: Car insurance provides financial protection against accidents that might arise while driving your vehicle. Less obvious: It also protects you and your family when you are pedestrians or in other people’s vehicles, but I’ll get to that later.

In New York, auto liability insurance is legally required. Specifically, you must have at least $25,000 to cover a victim of your negligent driving, and $50,000 coverage total if there is more than one victim. Further, New York auto insurance polices feature a minimum of $50,000 in “no-fault” coverage, which pays medical bills and lost income for those occupants of your vehicle who were injured (including yourself), and for any pedestrian you injured.

How to Properly Represent Injured Undocumented Immigrants in New York

February 15, 2023 | by Michael Bersani

Photo above: Me putting a farmworker injury case into storage.

I am one of the only personal injury lawyers in Upstate New York (Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo) who speaks fluent Spanish. I’m also married to a Guatemalan and move comfortably in the Latino community here. It’s no wonder, then, that over my 30 years or so of representing personal injury victims in Upstate, many of my clients have been “undocumented” Mexicans and Central Americans.

If you are a personal injury lawyer seeking to represent an undocumented Spanish speaking immigrant, here is what you need to know:

Governor Nixes Grieving Families Act which Would Have Righted A Wrong in New York’s Wrongful Death Law

February 2, 2023 | by Michael Bersani

At midnight on January 30 a clock ran out. That was the deadline by which our Governor had to sign the Grieving Families Act bill – S74A into law. Her failure to sign the bill into law is what is known as a “pocket veto”. The Governor’s deliberate failure to put pen to paper by that date and time was the death knell to the bill, which both the New York Senate and Assembly had overwhelmingly supported.

This was a tragedy for those in New York who care about civil justice. Why?

Let’s start by explaining what the now-expired “Grieving Families Act” was: A proposed law to allow recovery for “emotional loss” (grief) for families who loved ones die because of someone else’s negligence or wrongdoing. The law would have rewritten one of the most unfair laws New York has ever known. Most other States in the Union allow families of those who are killed through wrongdoing seek compensation for their emotional loss. New York’s law’s antiquated Wrongful Death law (N.Y. Est. Powers & Trusts Law § 5-4.1), which was written way back in 1847, does not. The Grieving Families Act was meant to right this wrong. Instead, the Governor let the bill die.

MICHAELS & SMOLAK HAS CHANGED! (and other news)

January 14, 2023 | by Michael Bersani

It’s been quite a while since this Central New York Injury Law blogger has posted anything. In fact, almost a year. It was a busy year and blogging gave way to serving our clients’ pressing needs, always our number 1 priority. But to quote Arnold Schwarzenegger (sort of), “we’re back!” And with lots of news:

News Item Number 1: “Michaels & Smolak” is no longer (sigh). Jan Smolak, one of our four lawyers, left the firm to go join his lawyer-wife’s practice, Perotto Law, in Rochester, New York. We wish Jan luck!

News Item Number 2: The other three “Michaels & Smolak” lawyers, Lee Michaels, Mike Bersani, and Dave Kalabanka. have remained right here in the same office in Auburn New York, but are now operating under the name “Michaels Bersani Kalabanka, P.C.”. Yeah, I know, that’s quite a mouthful, which is why we prefer to call ourselves “MBK Law”. Our new website is MBK-LAW.com

Dog-Bite Insurance Coverage Gets a Boost in New York

February 11, 2022 | by Michael Bersani

Dog bite victims’ lawyers (like me) have noticed a disturbing trend in recent years: Severe dog bite injuries are growing while insurance coverage for them is shrinking. Why? Two intersecting trends are the root cause:

Trend number 1: Dogs are getting meaner, and meaner. The percentage of new dogs that are pit-bull types (included mixes) has been growing. Pit bulls are now the fifth most popular dog to own, and that number is growing. They account for about 20% of dogs in the USA. The meaner dogs get, the more likely it is for you or your loved ones to become victims.

Trend number 2: More and more homeowner insurance companies are sneaking “dog-attack/bite” exclusions in their policies. Some of the carriers simply refuse to provide any coverage at all for dog-attack injuries. Others exclude only certain breeds – those considered most aggressive – including bit bulls, German shepherds and Doberman pinschers. The dog owner usually discovers the exclusion only after their dog has done the deed.

Everything You Need to Know about Car-On-Deer Collision Claims in Upstate New York

November 14, 2021 | by Michael Bersani

We are right in the middle of “regular-firearm” (as opposed to bow-and-arrow) deer hunting season in New York State. It started October 23 and ends December 12. So let’s talk about car-on-deer collisions, how to avoid them, and the legal consequences if you don’t.

Deer are a lot like you in that, if they are smart, they try to avoid personal injuries. This means running from bullets. And spooked deer don’t look both ways before crossing any roads that lie between them and safety.

Just like those deer, you need to watch out for your own safety, but instead of fleeing bullets, you need to avoid the fleeing deer.

Why We Advertise

October 8, 2021 | by Michael Bersani

Today I am going to blog about legal advertising and my love/hate relationship with it.

First, why do Syracuse NY area personal injury lawyers like us have to advertise at all?

The question is a fair one. After all, our law firm is, according not just to us, but to many of the best lawyers and judges in the area, one of the top personal injury law firms in all of Upstate New York. We have won many awards and recognitions for our outstanding results and performances in court. Judges and fellow lawyers sing our praises, as do former clients. So why do we have to advertise at all? Shouldn’t word of mouth bring us more cases than we can handle?

Michaels Bersani Kalabanka ONCE AGAIN AMONG THE HIGHEST RANKED PERSONAL INJURY LAW FIRMS IN THE SYRACUSE NY METROPOLITIAN AREA WITH ALL ITS LAWYERS LISTED IN BEST LAWYERS IN AMERICA© 2022

August 23, 2021 | by Michael Bersani

We are pleased to announce that all four of M&S’s lawyers have once again been ranked in the publication The Best Lawyers in America^©(2022 edition). Dave Kalabanka was listed for representing plaintiffs in personal injury and products liability litigation, Lee Michaels and Jan Smolak for personal injury litigation, and Mike Bersani for personal injury, products liability and professional malpractice litigation.

Since it was first published in 1983, The Best Lawyers in America^® has been regarded as the most serious guide to ranking and honoring top lawyers. In order to compile their Best Lawyers lists, the publishers use an exhaustive “peer-review” evaluation system. Lawyers and judges who have been named Best Lawyers are eligible to vote on the legal abilities of other lawyers based on their specific practice areas around the world. For the 2022 Edition of The Best Lawyers in America©, 10.8 million evaluations were analyzed, which resulted in more than 66,000 leading lawyers in 147 practice areas being included in the new edition. Lawyers are not required or allowed to pay a fee to be listed; therefore, inclusion in Best Lawyers is not a paid-for vanity listing. It is a true recognition by one’s peers of legal accomplishment.

We are proud of our top-ranked position in the The Best Lawyers in America publication. We promise to keep working hard to maintain that ranking. Michaels Bersani Kalabanka is a premier Syracuse-based law firm recognized around the State of New York for its legal excellence in the field of representing plaintiffs in personal injury, product liability, and professional Call us to get a free consultation about your case.

M&S Attorney Mike Bersani Named “Lawyer of the Year” for His Representation of Victims of Professional Malpractice in the Syracuse Metropolitan Area

August 19, 2021 | by Michael Bersani

Hello there blog readers! This is Dave Kalabanka, Mike Bersani’s partner. I’ve hijacked his blog for today to interview Mike about another important award he just got: Mike has been selected the 2022 “Lawyer of the Year” for the Syracuse metropolitan area in the field of “professional malpractice” for his outstanding representation of victims of legal or other professional malpractice. A publication called “Best Lawyers in America” bestows this honor on the lawyer with the highest overall positive peer-feedback (judges and other lawyers rate him higher than any other lawyer) for a specific practice area and geographic region. Yes, Mike was the highest ranking attorney in the field of representing victims of legal and other professional malpractice for the entire Syracuse Metropolitan area.

This new honor comes on the heels of Mike’s being named the 2021 “lawyer of the year” for the Syracuse Metropolitan area in the field of representing personal injury plaintiffs.

Given his second-year-in-a-row “Best Lawyer” designation, I decided to take some time from Mike’s busy schedule to interview him:

Can a J-walker struck by a car prevail in a personal injury case against the driver?

June 27, 2021 | by Michael Bersani

The answer to the question posed in the title of this blog post is “yes”. I will show you how this is true using a recent case I settled as an example.

My pedestrian-client was injured while j-walking across East Genesee Street in Auburn, right outside our main office. The pedestrian seemingly did everything wrong: She chose to cross the street a hundred feet or so from an intersection equipped with a traffic light and crosswalk. Further, she did so at night, dressed in dark clothing, so dark in fact that the witnesses who saw her lying on the pavement after the collision assumed she was a black trash bag that had blown into the road. The only thing that “tipped off” the witnesses that the black bundle in the road was a person was a shock of blond hair.

Despite these seemingly “bad facts”, we got a substantial settlement for her. How?