Kelsky Law

On January 26, 2012, the Miami-Dade County Board of County Commissioners approved the withdrawal of an appeal filed by a landowner seeking to gain approval for the construction of a cemetery after Brad E. Kelsky, Esq, and an expert economist, both retained by a well-organized homeowner’s group, defeated that application in front of the local zoning board of appeal.  The BOCC’s approval of the withdrawal was a final decision resulting in a complete victory for the homeowner’s group.

This article does not constitute legal advice or the formation of an attorney-client relationship, and is not for re-publication without express permission of the author.

Brad E. Kelsky, Esq., resolved a claim with an insurer for property damage caused by Hurricane Wilma in excess of the claim’s value.  The homeowner and the insurer agreed to the appraisal process and, following the issuance of an appraisal award, the insurer paid only part of the claim and denied payment for other property damage on the basis that the damage was not actually caused by Hurricane Wilma.  In litigation, the claim settled for more than the full value of the appraisal award.

This article does not constitute legal advice or the formation of an attorney-client relationship, and is not for re-publication without express permission of the author.

In December 2011, Brad E. Kelsky, Esq., represented a business owner in front of the City Commission for the City of Lauderhill appealing a decision that an application for a Special Exception Use expired which would have left the business owner unable to operate her business.  At public hearing, the City Commission allowed the application to proceed forward thereby enabling the business owner to continue her business operations.

This article does not constitute legal advice or the formation of an attorney-client relationship, and is not for re-publication without express permission of the author.

In October 2011, Brad E. Kelsky, Esq., in combination with a homeowner’s group and a team of experts, defeated a request by a publicly traded company to construct a cemetery on property located adjacent to a residential/agricultural area.  After months of hearings, the local zoning board determined that there was no need for the cemetery based upon economic calculations provided by the homeowner’s group’s expert.  The matter is presently on appeal in front of the Miami-Dade County Board of County Commissioners.

This article does not constitute legal advice or the formation of an attorney-client relationship, and is not for re-publication without express permission of the author.

There is no doubt that Facebook and Twitter are incredibly useful tools at sharing ideas, personal information and thoughts among a larger community.  I am sure that this will also be true of Google Plus (who reportedly had 10 million members in two weeks http://goo.gl/VqxIi).   Postings, tweets and blog entries are, for the most part, discoverable.  Thus, do not share with the public those things that may be used against you in a lawsuit.  For example, if you are in an accident, don’t describe to the public how the accident occurred or whether or not you were injured.  If you have a construction claim, do not call the builder a liar or a thief.  Be careful about what you share as others will likely be able to see that information even though you never expected it to become visible.

This article does not constitute legal advice or the formation of an attorney-client relationship, and is not for re-publication without express permission of the author.

Most first-party insurance policies, your automobile policy, your homeowner’s policy, etc., have a clause that requires an insured to submit to an EUO (Examination Under Oath) when requested by the insurance company.  In reality, an EUO is no different than a deposition and can be used against an insured for many reasons (and, perhaps, by an opposing party) in litigation.  For this reason, in a claim that one might make against their own insurance company, an insured should strongly consider contacting an attorney before providing an EUO to the insurance company given the effect it may have in case the insurance claim proceeds to litigation.

This article does not constitute legal advice or the formation of an attorney-client relationship, and is not for re-publication without express permission of the author.

Following an accident, it is common for insurance adjusters representing the potential defendant to try and get a “statement” from an injured party as to how the accident occurred, what injuries they have, who the witnesses were, etc.   Often, the adjuster attempts to get a statement very quickly after the accident and before an attorney is retained.  It is our recommendation that an injured party not give a statement without first consulting an attorney.  If, however, an injured party already gave a statement, that person is entitled to obtain a copy of it and should request it from the insurance adjuster. Regardless, an injured victim needs to let their attorney know that they gave a statement so the attorney can obtain a copy of it.

This article does not constitute legal advice or the formation of an attorney-client relationship, and is not for re-publication without express permission of the author.

Other than junk mail, we scan the hundreds of documents that we receive weekly and these documents, for the most part, are not scanned for OCR (optical character recognition). Acrobat Pro does a nice job of converting a scanned pdf to OCR but, if the document hasn’t been processed that way, it is not read as “text.” This is significant because apps like iAnnotate and Goodreader will not allow a user to highlight non-OCR’d text.

For example, I’m getting ready for a short trial on Thursday. I was unable to highlight a deposition in iAnnotate because it was not OCR processed. This is a big problem because, in order to highlight, I would have to open the transcript in Acrobat Pro, run an OCR, save the document in the OCR format (hoping that Acrobat correctly processed the OCR), move the file to Dropbox and then hope that all goes well for its use in iAnnotate. This is fairly onerous (tedious) given these steps.

Alternatively, you can use iAnnotate’s pencil tool that allows you to draw on the text. I like this tool and it’s great for many things, e.g., marking up an exhibit, circling and handwriting notes, but I really want the ability to highlight. This is my polite plea to the iAnnotate developer to develop an OCR tool. At that point in time, the program would be nearly perfect.

Las lesiones corporales (daños al  cuerpo) pueden demorar días o semanas después de un accidente para aparecer.  Por esta razón, aunque usted tengan dudas si una reclamación por  lesiones corporales/daños personales puedes existir en un futuro, nosotros le sugerimos a las víctimas de accidentes que mantengan un diario o agenda sobre los dolores y/o otros síntomas que tengan durante los días y las semanas después de un accidente.   Durante una demanda, es común que un demandado reclame que “la víctima no sufrió lesiones/daños porque ella o el no buscaron atención medica inmediatamente para sus dolores.”   Tener un diario o agenda ayuda documentar el progreso de sus dolores/lesiones  y es un instrumento muy útil para superar esa defensa.

Este artículo no contiene consejo legal y no constituye la formación de una relación entre abogado y cliente.  La re-publicación de este artículo no es permitida sin el perimisio expreso del autor.

In construction defect litigation, it is common for an owner to email the contractor about purported construction problems.  It is likewise common for the contractor to email the owner.  Absent some type of legal privilege, these emails are discoverable and subject to production in litigation.

As a result, keep in mind the following:

1. Do not delete or otherwise destroy the emails that were sent and that were received;

2. Keep in mind that some third person will read those emails so exercise judgment and caution as to what and how things are said; and

3. Correct the sender’s statements if they need correction but do so politely and accurately.

Emails can be shown to a judge or jury so remember your audience and how you would want them to perceive you.

This article does not constitute legal advice or the formation of an attorney-client relationship, and is not for re-publication without express permission of the author.