Category: Summer 2012 Pennsylvania Legal Update

Death of a Client before the Required Beginning Date (RBD) If the beneficiary is not a designated beneficiary, the balance of the IRA must be completely distributed before Dcc. 31 of the year of the fifth anniversary of the client’s death (“the five-year rule”). If the beneficiary is a designated beneficiary, the balance of the […]

State and local governments are cloaked with broad immunity from private lawsuits. While many exceptions to state and local governmental immunity exist, they tend to be narrow and technical. Governmental immunity doesn’t protect only government agencies; it also often extends to government officials, employees, and Volunteers. But where a County-owned nursing home is operated by […]

Spectators at baseball games assume the risk of a variety of injuries-balls and even bats sometimes hit fans and can cause serious injuries. A Phillies fan who tried to get around the law of assumption of the risk struck out when the Pennsylvania Superior Court threw his case out of court. The spectator suffered a serious […]

A structured settlement is a completely voluntary agreement between an injured person and the insurance company obligated to pay for the negligent conduct of the person or company that caused the victim’s injuries. In a structured settlement, an injury victim doesn’t receive compensation for his or her injuries in one lump sum. Instead, the victim […]

A University of Pittsburgh student won the right to sue the fraternity’s chapter advisor after the student suffered renal failure, seizures, and hypertension requiring three weeks of hospitalization and kidney dialysis due to injuries caused by protracted “paddling’ during his fraternity initiation. The Pennsylvania Superior Court held that while a national fraternity and its regional […]

Late in 2011, Pennsylvania passed changes to the laws on mandatory immunizations required for public school children and increased the obligations of school districts to report to state health officials on immunization records Vaccines protectus from a host of diseases that once regularly brought suffering and death to the global population for their students. Pennsylvania pediatricians […]