The webinar, “Screening and Investigation Potential Medical Malpractice Claims,” is co-hosted by  Brian Zorn, Faraci Lange partner, and Elizabeth Zorn, legal nurse consultant, as part of the American Association of Legal Nurse Consultants’ (AALNC) monthly educational webinar series.

Brian Zorn is one of Faraci Lange’s senior trial attorneys focusing his practice on medical malpractice.  Elizabeth Zorn, BSN, RN, LNCC, has been an AALNC member for more than 15 years and recently began a three-year term on its board of directors.

The AALNC is a not-for-profit membership organization dedicated to the professional enhancement and growth of registered nurses practicing in the specialty of legal nurse consulting and to advancing this nursing specialty. AALNC is the preeminent resource for professionals with an interest in the legal nurse consulting arena including novice and veteran legal nurse consultants.

The Sept. 20 webinar costs $35 for AALNC members and $50 for non-members. To register, people can visit www.aalnc.org/edupro/WebinarSeries.cfm.

The attorneys named are:

• Matthew F. Belanger, in the practice areas of personal injury litigation and product liability litigation. Belanger, a resident of Brighton, has been named to Best Lawyers since 2008.
• John A. Falk, in medical malpractice law, personal injury litigation and product liability litigation. The Brighton resident also was named to Best Lawyers in 2009.
• Angelo G. Faraci, in legal malpractice law, medical malpractice law, personal injury litigation and product liability litigation. Faraci, who resides in Rochester, has been listed in Best Lawyers since its inception in 1983.
• Paul K. Lange, in medical malpractice law, personal injury litigation and product liability litigation. First named to Best Lawyers in 2001, Lange resides in Rochester.
• Joseph A. Regan, in medical malpractice law, personal injury litigation and product liability litigation. The Rochester resident has been named to Best Lawyers since 2005.
• Stephen G. Schwarz, in medical malpractice law, personal injury litigation and product liability litigation. The Fairport resident was first named to Best Lawyers in 1999.
• Brian M. Zorn, in medical malpractice law, personal injury litigation and product liability litigation. Zorn, who resides in Victor, has been named to Best Lawyers since 1995.

Best Lawyers, the oldest and most respected peer-review publication in the legal profession, is based on an exhaustive annual survey in which more than 39,000 leading attorneys cast almost 3.1 million votes on the legal abilities of other lawyers in their practice areas. Since its inception in 1983, Best Lawyers has become universally regarded as the definitive guide to legal excellence.

Because Best Lawyers is based on a peer-review survey, and because lawyers are not required or allowed to pay a fee to be listed, inclusion in Best Lawyers is considered a singular honor. Corporate Counsel magazine has called Best Lawyers “the most respected referral list of attorneys in practice.”

Steven Naifeh, president of Best Lawyers, said, “We continue to believe – as we have believed for 28 years – that recognition by one’s peers is the most meaningful form of recognition in the legal profession.”

Cook focuses his practice on commercial and real estate litigation, environmental law, agriculture law, labor and employment, and personal injury law. Before joining Faraci Lange LLP he was an equity partner at Nixon Peabody LLP and previously served as the chair of the real estate litigation team.

He is a member of the Monroe County Bar Association, the New York State Bar Association and the American Bar Association. Cook earned his law degree and his master’s degree in Public Administration from Brigham Young University. He has been recognized as a “New York Super Lawyer” and has received an AV rating, the highest rating available, from Martindale-Hubbell.

Previously employed as an associate at the New York City law firm of Weitz & Luxenberg, Matarazzo focuses her practice on toxic torts, environmental law, medical malpractice and products liability.

Matarazzo earned her law degree from the Rutgers University School of Law Newark and her bachelor’s degree from the University of Vermont. She resides in the city of Rochester, N.Y.

The award is given to attorneys who are active in the community, demonstrate a commitment to the community through activities or pro bono work, and who demonstrate leadership and above-average achievements in day-to-day legal assignments. 

Jordan focuses her practice on medical malpractice, complex tort and toxic tort, premises liability, products liability and automotive negligence cases. She is a resident of Farmington, N.Y.

Schwarz is being honored for his outstanding contribution to the Bar Association’s continuing legal education process. Schwarz, previously recognized with the Pauley Award in 2004, was presented the 2010 award at the Monroe County Bar Association’s annual Installation Dinner.

Faraci Lange’s managing partner, Schwarz focuses his legal practice on personal injury and business litigation, including medical malpractice, serious auto accident cases, product liability, and toxic tort and environmental contamination cases in both state and federal courts.

Stephen Schwarz resides in the town of Fairport, N.Y.

A Monroe County Supreme Court jury awarded Neil and Patti Goldstein a verdict that totals $187,393.35 (including interest) against Spall Realty Corporation and Brookwood Building Corporation for causing a mold infestation of their home at the Settlers Green development in Pittsford, New York. The jury did not find that the TJI joists on which most of the mold grew were defective at the time they left the manufacturer. The court found that Spall and Brookwood were liable for the damages due to numerous construction defects proven at trial that made the basement wet and promoted the mold growth. The homeowners’ experts had also testified that because one particularly dangerous species of mold was discovered not only on the outside of the Weyerhaeuser TJI joists but also inside them, and also inside other TJI joists that were tested from other sources, that the mold must have been inside since the time of manufacture. However, the jury did not find sufficient proof to make that determination of when the mold entered the construction materials and therefore found in favor of Weyerhaeuser on this point.The jury awarded pain and suffering damages of $12,500 each to Dr. Goldstein and his wife Patti plus an additional $132,566 to pay for the cost of remediating the mold, the personal property that had to be destroyed due to mold contamination and for the loss of use of their property from the time the mold was first discovered until the time that the remediation was finally completed, a period of 18 months.  By law interest is also awarded back to the time of loss for these property damages, totally an additional $29,827.

“We are very happy with the jury’s verdict, although we also thought that Weyerhaeuser should have been found liable” said Stephen G. Schwarz, of Faraci Lange, LLP, the law firm representing the plaintiffs. “My clients have suffered greatly both financially and emotionally as a result of this ordeal and we are happy that they will now be compensated for what they have endured over the past four years”.

“It has been a long hard road and Spall has fought us each step of the way, forcing us to remediate the property ourselves and then sue them to get our money back” added Patti Goldstein. “It will be great to get on with our lives and put this horrible experience behind us. We only hope that other people who are contemplating building with Spall and any of his shell corporations will learn from our misery.”

Dr. Neil Goldstein commented further:  “We are happy that this trial has shed light on Spall Realty Corporation and Brookwood Building Corporation and their principal Ted Spall, Jr. and the numerous construction defects that led to the mold growing in our home. What is more important is that the court and jury have found that Ted Spall, Jr. is accountable for the mistakes made in homes built by his companies as hard as he has tried to avoid any accountability whatsoever.”

 “Spall testified at trial that he has a dozen or more corporations that ‘build’ houses but that none of these corporations have any employees” Schwarz said. “He uses these corporations as a legal shield when things go wrong with these homes. Although his website, spallhomes.com claims that Spall Homes Corporation builds the homes, he admitted on the witness stand that Spall Homes Corporation has not existed since 1989 when it was merged into Spall Realty Corporation and that he uses that name to attract buyers and then switches to one of the shell corporations when they sign the contract. The court and jury certainly saw through this for what it was, a sham” said Schwarz.

Ted Spall, Jr. is the principal behind Settlers Green and also a number of other developments in Pittsford including Greythorne Hill, Harvest Glen, Rollins Crossing and Lancaster Rise.

For more information contact Katrina Connelly, Faraci Lange, LLP, 585-325-5150 or kconnelly@faraci.com. 

A Pittsford dentist and his wife are pursuing legal action against Spall Realty Corp. and two other companies for damages suffered due to mold infestation of their newly constructed home in the Settlers Green Development.

Neil Goldstein, D.D.S., and Patti Goldstein allege numerous causes of action in their complaint filed in New York State Supreme Court, including negligence against Spall and Brookwood Building Corp. Weyerhaeuser Co. also is named in the suit because most of the mold grew on the company’s Trus Joist product, which had mold inside of it at the time of installation. At trial, scheduled to begin June 7, 2010, the Goldsteins are seeking $100,000 in remediation expenses and discarded personal property, plus damages for illnesses caused by the mold, property use loss and property devaluation.

Stephen G. Schwarz, managing partner of Faraci Lange LLP, is counsel for the plaintiffs. “Instead of getting the home of their dreams, Neil and Patti Goldstein suffered a health and economic nightmare due to negligence and shoddy construction,” Schwarz said. “This case raises significant questions about Spall Realty, which has set up multiple ‘shell’ companies, apparently to avoid accountability for the homes it is building in the Greater Rochester area. It also raises serious concerns about the safety and desirability of Weyerhaeuser’s Trus Joist product.”

Mold Discovered at 19 Settlers Green

The Goldsteins moved into their new home at 19 Settlers Green in Pittsford in September 2004. They immediately noticed very wet basement walls, and tried unsuccessfully to dry out the basement by constantly running two dehumidifiers. They raised this issue with Spall Realty on several occasions, but the Spall employees told them that as long as there was not water running out of the foundation wall, they were not obligated to do anything about it.

Over the course of 2005, the Goldsteins both began to suffer from frequent upper respiratory symptoms. In February 2006, Dr. Goldstein noticed yellow and white growth on the Weyerhaeuser’s Trus Joists — visible from the basement — that supported the floor above. He discovered that almost every joist was covered with a yellow or white substance that he thought might be mold. Testing confirmed that mold was growing on the joists and dangerously high levels of mold spores were in the air. Months of negotiations transpired but Spall Realty refused to agree to remediate the mold unless the Goldsteins would sign off that they were satisfied with the job in advance of any work being done.

Improper Design, Installation

Following advice of the Monroe County Health Department, the Goldsteins had the mold removed because it posed a health hazard — the levels so high in the basement that if it were a public building it would have to be closed. The Goldsteins also hired contractors to determine what was causing the wet conditions. Contractors determined that the drainage system, gutter system and grading of the property were either improperly designed or installed, causing water to pool against the foundation walls. This caused humidity in the basement and resulted in mold growth.

• The drains around the foundation, which were supposed to take water away from the foundation walls, were not connected to anything.
• The pipe that was supposed to take water from the gutters and the sump pump to the storm sewer in the street was crushed and blocked.

The Goldsteins had to close off their basement for months and to move out of the home while workers dressed in hazard suits with respirators removed the mold. The remediation, including the value of property that had to be disposed of, cost the Goldsteins more than $100,000.

Spall’s Shell Companies

The plaintiffs initially sued Brookwood (the company they contracted with through Spall to build their home) and Weyerhaeuser, seeking recovery of their expenses and compensation for their damages. During the case’s pre-trial phase, it was discovered that Brookwood had no employees and was only a shell corporation through which money was passed from the Goldsteins and other buyers to Spall Realty.

In addition, Brookwood was one of multiple corporations Spall Realty President Ted Spall Jr. had created to try to avoid accountability for defects in any of the homes his company built. Despite the fact that Spall Realty’s Web site (www.spallhomes.com) touts the company as “one of the oldest and most trusted residential builders in Rochester,” Mr. Spall testified that Spall Realty did not perform residential construction and that it was all done by one of his other corporations. During the course of the litigation, multiple lots in the Settlers Green Development, which were listed as owned by Brookwood, were mysteriously transferred to other Spall-owned shell corporations.

Two Companies, No Assets

According to Stephen Schwarz, the latest development in the case involved Spall Realty and Brookwood informing the court, through legal counsel, that the companies have no money and may not defend themselves at trial. There was no explanation about what happened to the assets of the two corporations, one of which has been in business for more than 35 years.