Russell & Lazarus - May/June 2021

Russell & Lazarus - May/June 2021

Exclusively handling serious and catastrophic personal injury claims as well as wrongful death claims due to the negligence of individuals or business entities.

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AUTO COLLISIONS

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CONSTRUCTION SITE ACCIDENTS

The Right Help When You Need It Most!

MOTORCYCLE COLLISIONS

ELDER ABUSE CLAIMS BRAIN TRAUMA CLAIMS WRONGFUL DEATH CLAIMS

BICYCLE ACCIDENTS

May/June 2021

TRIP/SLIP-AND-FALL ACCIDENTS

WANT TO GET PAID ‘UNDER THE TABLE’? … DON’T!

As the old saying goes, nothing is certain but death and taxes. When it comes to the latter, though, some workers are tempted to try to skip out on paying taxes by agreeing to work and get paid under the table. While that means you see a bigger paycheck each week, it also means you’re foregoing important legal protections and putting yourself at risk for jail time. In the world of personal injury, issues arise when we try to obtain compensation for our clients for pain and suffering, past and future medical bills, and lost earnings. When an employee is "on the books," those lost earnings are simple to calculate. But for those working under the table, it’s not so simple, and it can really hurt a claim, but that’s not the only reason to avoid doing it. Here are seven good reasons to avoid getting paid under the table. It’s illegal and a federal crime. If you don’t report income, you’re breaking the law and putting yourself at risk of serving six months to three years in federal prison if you get caught. That’s reason enough for many of us to avoid it, but there are plenty of other reasons too! You forfeit future Social Security earnings. A big portion of payroll taxes goes to fund Social Security. Your lifetime earnings are used to calculate your check upon retirement. Not reporting earnings means you’ll receive a lower Social Security check and can lose out on up to $2,000 a month. In your younger working years, you might be tempted to think you’re simply saving on taxes by getting paid under the table, but when you retire — a time you’ll really need the extra dough — you’re likely to regret not having paid into the system that’s meant to support you in your later years. You aren’t protected by workers’ compensation. If you’re working under the table, you aren’t legally considered an employee, and your employer will not declare you to their workers’ compensation insurance company. This means you are not eligible to receive these benefits — which cover medical bills and lost earnings — if you’re hurt on the job.

helps workers who are temporarily disabled due to an off-the-job injury and who cannot work for a period of time as a result. If you aren’t paying into this fund, that means if you get hurt off the job, you can’t make a claim against your state disability fund. You’ll miss out on important employment protections. If you get terminated from your under-the-table job, you have no legal rights under the law. Workers in California are protected from being terminated for certain reasons, but when you’re employed under the table, your employer has no obligation to keep you employed, and you have no legal recourse if they unjustly fire you. You can’t claim lost earnings. I mentioned this point earlier. If you get injured and file a personal injury claim, you’ll likely want to claim lost earnings. But if you’re working under the table, you can’t. You’d have to admit you were committing a felony during the time that you were paid under the table, or you have to waive your lost earnings claim. Some clients are very upset when I tell them that bad news, and unfortunately, it dramatically devalues their claim. It’s a dangerous slippery slope. Taking home untaxed income can lead you to establish a certain lifestyle you won’t want to scale back, and you can come to view paying taxes as a nuisance; but consider what will happen at the end of a 35-year work career: If you've paid no taxes, you’ll have no Social Security benefits, and in the meantime, you have subjected yourself to the U.S. government coming after you for money that you owe them that cannot be discharged in bankruptcy.

The moral of the story is, none of us like paying taxes, but if you try to forgo it by working for an employer under the table, it’s not the

U.S. government that’s getting the short end of the stick; it will be you!. To see one way this played out in real life to where it dramatically impacted a claim my office handled, check out the case study on Page 3.

You can’t make a state disability claim. Some of the taxes taken out of your paycheck go into the state disability fund, which

–Chris Russell

RUSSELL & LAZARUS APC 1401 Dove Street | Suite 310 | Newport Beach, CA 92660 Direct: 949-851-0222 Toll Free: 800-268-9228 www.russellandlazarus.com

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5 Easy Ways to Get Everyone Moving GET FIT WITH YOUR FAMILY

May is National Physical Fitness and Sports Month. As a parent, you probably know exercise is important for your children’s physical development. It helps build healthy bones, muscles, and joints and reduces the risk of developing diabetes and other diseases later in life. But did you know that physical activity also has many mental and behavioral health benefits? It’s been shown to improve children’s cognitive skills and concentration, boost their self-esteem, and reduce symptoms of stress, anxiety, and depression. One of the best ways to encourage healthy behaviors in your children is by modeling them yourself. Studies have found that more than 80% of adolescents and adults are not getting enough aerobic activity, showing that children often follow in their parents’ footsteps and that exercising together can benefit everyone. You may be thinking it’s hard enough just to get yourself to the gym, but Stephen Virgilio, author of “Active Start for Healthy Kids,” encourages parents not to limit themselves to traditional forms of exercise. Instead, think of exercise more broadly as “leading an active lifestyle.” And remember that exercise can be fun and a great way to get in more family time.

Here are five easy ways to incorporate more movement into your family’s day.

• Create a

walking ritual. Start walking around the neighborhood before or after dinner each night. Aim for a 20-minute stroll. • Have a dance party. Clear some space in the living room, make a playlist with everyone’s favorite tunes, and boogie down for as long as you have the energy. • Turn chores into games. Dirt has invaded from outer space and must be eliminated. Set the scene with your kids, grab your tools, and get to work removing the enemy while having fun. • Incorporate simple exercises into screen time. Start by making up fun names for exercises like situps or jumping jacks. Then, challenge each other to see who can do the most during your favorite show’s commercial breaks. • Get fit in the great outdoors. Cleaning up the yard, planting and maintaining a garden, or just running around outside are all great ways to get in more movement.

Team Member Spotlight Jorge Ramirez’s Path to Law

Jorge Ramirez has over 20 years of experience with personal injury cases and has helped recover millions of dollars in life-changing compensation for his deserving clients. Jorge’s path to law was an interesting one. Being the first in his family of nine to attend college, Jorge opted to attend a junior college. “I didn’t know how to get into a university because no one in my family had

paralegal not only helped Jorge confirm he was on the right career path, but it also allowed him to save up money for law school.

After completing school, Jorge continued working in the personal injury field. “I like helping other people. We change lives,” he said, recounting several experiences of dropping off settlement checks to clients. “Many are blue-collar workers who do hard jobs that others don’t want to do,” he said, “These guys work with their bodies, and if they’re injured, they’re done. It’s a good feeling to help them out.” Jorge has since had over two decades of successful work as a personal injury attorney and has been at our firm for four years. He says he loves the great team environment here and is looking forward to getting back to the team-building activities halted by COVID-19. After getting his start as a paralegal, Jorge has a special appreciation for his paralegal, Sean Goedinghaus. Outside of work, Jorge likes to hit the golf course and enjoys spending time with his wife and two kids. His oldest, Ashley, works in health care administration and graduated with a Master’s degree. His son Luke, 11, is following in Jorge’s wife’s footsteps as an athlete. They enjoy watching his games together. He’s also a big boxing fan and has even represented two professional boxers.

ever done it.” His mother had a high school education, but his father only had a third-grade education. Jorge helped paved the way for his younger siblings to attend college, as well. Like many college-aged kids, Jorge didn’t know what he wanted to do at the time, but when he enrolled in a career planning class, a test said he was well-suited to be a lawyer. He balked at first when his teacher told him that would mean eight more years of school, but he was intrigued with the idea of becoming a paralegal to get a sense of what a career in law would look like. Working as a

RUSSELL & LAZARUS APC 1401 Dove Street | Suite 310 | Newport Beach, CA 92660 Direct: 949-851-0222 Toll Free: 800-268-9228 www.russellandlazarus.com 2

CASE STUDY Not a Fun Time at the Ballpark – By Chris Russell

As a young attorney, I was assigned a fairly dramatic case. The short version is that my clients were a self-employed husband and wife trucking team who earned $100,000 a year. They were injured while watching a motocross race. The facts of how they were injured were dramatic, but their scheme to not pay taxes put a whole bunch of drama in my life.

I gave the tax returns to the other side (I didn’t know at the time you should never do this!), which reflected $300,000 in lost earnings. We made a demand of $1.5 million based on what we thought was a $750,000 past and future earnings claim. When I told my clients about the offer, they finally told me that they’d given me duplicate tax returns that they only used to show income when they wanted loans from banks. I was mortified! The insurance company applied to the IRS to get their actual filed tax returns. In the meantime, we attempted to negotiate the claim. I was sweating bullets the entire time. While trying to enjoy a family vacation at Disneyland, I ended up calling the defense attorney at every pay phone I saw (this was before cellphones) to see if they agreed to the settlement before the IRS was to produce the real tax returns. They finally made an offer of $750,000, about half of what the claim was worth, which I convinced my clients to take because it was better than getting nothing and possibly going to prison for lying under oath and committing tax fraud. In the end, my clients lost money (and I earned a lot of gray hairs) by not being truthful, and we were forced to settle the claim because they could not risk being prosecuted for lying. The moral of the story is, as usual, that honesty is the best policy, especially when it comes to paying your taxes.

Case Facts: My clients went to Anaheim stadium (where the Angels play) to watch a motocross event. The field was transformed into big dirt mounds for the race, and my clients were sitting in the stands eight rows up. Between motocross races, a drag car appeared on the field to excite the crowd and promote the upcoming Winter Nationals by revving its engine and showering sparks onto the infield.

However, as the driver crossed the infield, he hit the wrong pedal and hurtled his dragster at 60 mph into a sideline fence, causing it to explode into hundreds of pieces that flew into the crowd, seriously injuring my clients with multiple fractures, lacerations, and contusions. The wife had to have knee surgery; the husband needed neck surgery. Neither could work. The Outcome: When I asked them to provide me support for their lost earnings, they gave me their tax returns. As it turns out, the clients were fudging on their taxes (similar to being paid “under the table”).

MANGO SHRIMP CEVICHE Courtesy of Our Sensational Litigation Clerk, Sarah Kuntz

MEET THE NEWEST MEMBERS OF OUR TEAM

INGREDIENTS

• 2 bags of small, pre-peeled, cooked shrimp (70–90 per pound) or 2 bags of large shrimp (cut into bite size pieces) • 3 medium tomatoes

• 1 onion • Cilantro

• 2 lemons • Salt and pepper, to taste • Tortilla chips and/or tostada shells • Optional: Tapatio hot sauce

• 1 stalk celery • 1–2 mangos • 2–3 avocados

The team members are (L-R): Sabrina Zeglovitch (Breakdown Clerk), Kenz McClure (Receptionist), Kat Yabut (Pre-Lit Clerk), and Sarah Kuntz (Lit Clerk).

DIRECTIONS

1. Clean shrimp and rinse if needed. Dice all veggies and fruit (except lemons) and add everything into a large bowl. 2. Cut the lemons in half and squeeze 1 lemon first, then gradually add more juice depending on your taste.

3. Refrigerate covered for 2–3 hours before serving so all the flavors can soak in.

4. Serve on tortilla chips (Scoops are the best!) or tostada shells.

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INSIDE

this issue

PG 1 PG 2 PG 3 PG 4

Want to Get Paid ‘Under the Table’? … Don’t!

5 Ways to Increase Your Family’s Fitness Spotlight on Jorge Ramirez

Not a Fun Time at the Ballpark Mango Shrimp Ceviche

Testimonials Case Results

TESTIMONIALS

CASE RESULTS

$325,000 SEMI VS. AUTO Pre-existing conditions are not a bar to recovering damages. A 65-year-old driver was injured in a motor vehicle collision when a semi-truck made an unprotected left turn as our client was traveling legally through the intersection. Our client had prior back issues, but the collision aggravated the condition, requiring pain management treatment in order to bring her back to her pre-accident condition and avoid surgery. $450,000 SEMI VS. AUTO What happens when the driver of a semi admits nothing, denies everything, and makes counter accusations in a rear-end collision to avoid responsibility? When a semi-truck rear- ended our client’s vehicle, the operator of the semi-truck denied responsibility for causing the collision. Our team obtained the testimony and evidence necessary to hold the operator of the truck responsible for damages caused to our client. $125,000 SEMI VS. SEMI Even careful semi-truck operators are at risk for injury due to careless semi-truck operators. A trucker who was sleeping in the camper compartment of his semi-truck was thrown from the sleeper onto the floorboards when another semi-truck ran into our client’s parked vehicle. The fall from the sleeper onto the floorboards caused head, neck, and back injuries.

“A huge thank you to Marc Lazarus of Russell & Lazarus for contacting me on a Friday evening and quickly scheduling a phone conference for Saturday morning. My daughter was involved in an accident that was 100% the other driver's fault, and he answered all our questions and addressed our concerns with the utmost professionalism. He was empathetic, and I was taken back by how easy he was to talk to. If you have a case, he'll take care of all your needs from start to finish.” –Joelle P.

RUSSELL & LAZARUS APC 1401 Dove Street | Suite 310 | Newport Beach, CA 92660 Direct: 949-851-0222 Toll Free: 800-268-9228 www.russellandlazarus.com

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