Arturo Gonzalez (for the sake of privacy, not his real name) will receive more than $3,500,000.00 in workers’ compensation and personal injury benefits. I wish that Arturo had never been injured, and that employers throughout New York made every effort to keep their workplaces safe, but at least Arturo will be compensated for his injuries and his suffering, as he learns to make a new life.
Arturo was a construction laborer in New York City. He was hit by falling construction debris, and immediately knew his life would never be the same. His shoulder and neck were injured, and he required fusion surgery to his cervical spine, and was totally disabled as he struggled to retain his strength and mobility, and to cope with disabling pain.
I immediately filed for workers’ compensation for Arturo, and shortly after that, Arturo filed suit for personal injuries in New York’s Supreme Court. All of his medical bills, including the surgery, were paid by his employer’s workers’ compensation insurance company, and he received a compensation check every two weeks.
The insurance companies in both cases fought hard, as insurance companies always do, to keep Arturo from getting his rightful benefits. Construction workers, demolition workers, men and women falling from scaffolds and roofs and ladders–they are all forced to fight insurance companies for benefits that they have paid for with their blood and broken bodies.
However, Arturo succeeded in forcing a terrific settlement, and though we can never take that accident back, as we would wish, at least we can say that Arturo is able again to provide for himself and his family, through his workers’ compensation and personal injury benefits.