Orlando De Castroverde

This was a car crash case arising from a car crash on September 15, 2021. Our client was Carolina Castro-Gaytan (Carolina). Carolina was 37 years-old at the time of the crash. Carolina was driving straight through an intersection when the Defendant ran a red light and t-boned Carolina. Carolina had moderate damage to her car. The Defendant told her insurer in a recorded statement the next day that she looked down at her GPS and when she looked up the light was red and she hit Carolina. Our client’s son was in the car in a child seat and thankfully he was not injured.

Police responded and prepared a report. Carolina did not take an ambulance and did not seek any emergency care. Instead, Carolina came to our office seeking help. She began treatment with chiro for sprain/strain in her neck and back. She had no prior neck or back injuries/pain before the crash. Eventually, she began getting cervical TESI injections in her neck which provided her significant relief (3 total). She also had 2 facet injections in her back. Carolina’s treating pain management doctor, Dr. Qureshi, recommended lifetime future cervical TESIs.

The trial was in December 2024. Carolina had not seen a doctor since January, about 1 year before the trial. This was because of her fear of the injections. Carolina said she would wait as long as possible before returning for a repeat injection. When her deposition was taken, she honestly reported no pain. Defense argued that our client was in pain because of her obesity and that it was a minor crash with speeds less than 8 mph. Defense counsel retained a Pain Management doctor, Dr. McKenna, who initially said in his reports that extrusions are common and pre-existing/degenerative and that Carolina only suffered a sprain/strain in this crash.

For jury selection, the Judge allowed us about three days to pick the jury. These were not full days, however. By the end of day three we had picked a jury. Orlando did the jury selection and Millie argued all the cause challenges. We also had our in-house team-members Jeanelly, Josie and Andrea help us pick the jury. We had several cause challenges granted and were overall happy with our jury.

We started the trial with our treating doctor Mark Kabins who is an orthopedic surgeon. Dr. Kabins did a great job teaching the jury about the anatomy and how trauma like a car crash can cause significant injuries. We had Dr. Kabins come down off the stand to show the jury the spine and go over the anatomy. Also, we pulled up the MRI images on the televisions so Dr. Kabins could show the jury the “extrusions” that Carolina likely suffered in the car crash. We later called Dr. Quereshi, Carolina’s treating pain management doctor. We also retained Dr. Quereshi as an expert, so he was both a treater and an expert. Dr. Quereshi also did some teaching for the jury and commented on the extrusions and opined that the extrusions were caused by the car crash. We followed up with our client’s long time boyfriend and father of their son, who testified about the damages. We had a scare with his testimony when the boyfriend denied ever having talked to Millie or I before the case when that was not true. We later had to fix that on re-cross and get him to admit that he did in fact talk to us before testifying. Fortunately, that did not turn out to be an issue with the jury. We followed up with the Defendant. We got some good concessions from the Defendant looking down at her GPS and running the red light. Our last witness was Carolina and she did well in telling her story of growing up in a small farm village in Mexico and living a tough and difficult life in Mexico before coming to the United States and Las Vegas where she now worked as food prep person at a downtown Pizza shop. We showed through Carolina’s testimony that because of her injuries she could no longer do the hard work she did before and how it caused her shame.

The defense called their medical expert, Dr. Mckenna as their first and only witness. He took the stand and came up with a brand new opinion stating that the MRI showed no extrusion. Millie and I looked at each other when we heard Dr. Mckenna give that new opinion. We were asking ourselves “do we object” “do we not object”. We decided not to object to the testimony. We did not want to look like we were trying to hide or run away from any evidence offered by their expert or to make it look like we needed protection from the Judge. So we opted to let Dr. McKenna testify about these new opinions, in particular, that the MRI did not show any extrusions. We were able during the cross to discredit his testimony. We exposed how despite drafting four reports and having the case for approximately two years, he never once gave that opinion and that it was not until he got a call from the defense lawyer during trial that he decided to give that opinion. We also were able to discredit Dr. Mckenna with the articles he cited in his report. In one article, the defense expert actually said the opposite of what the article said. We exposed him on that and how that was very misleading for the jury. We also showed the jury how another article he cited was not applicable to our facts. In sum, we effectively used the materials he cited in his report against him. After the trial, the jury commented that they did NOT believe Dr. Mckenna at all and that we crushed him on cross.

25k Progressive policy – this is an Open policy case.

Past medical bills $108,000.

Our OOJ to beat $225,000.

During trial defense offered us $120,000

We countered the 120k with 400k

Defense never offered more than 120k

Jury awarded:

Past medical: $88,975

Past pain: $85,176

Future medical: $892,330

Future pain: $653,496

Total Verdict: $1,719,975

This Defendant was insured with Progressive. This case is up on an appeal. The appeal has been briefed and we are waiting on the Court’s decision.