A tower of terror, indeed.

Opening arguments were heard recently in the trial of a personal injury lawsuit filed by a man who experienced a stroke after riding a famous attraction a Walt Disney World in Florida.

In one of the few injury lawsuits filed against the famed amusement park that made it to trial, 80-year-old Marvin Cohen is suing Disney for an injury he claims he sustained 12 years ago while riding the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror, according to the Orlando Sentinel. The ride is now a part of the park’s Hollywood Studios area.

Cohen’s lawyers made the case that he was physically active, working as a housing developer, before the taking the ride on March 28, 1998.

His attorneys went on to say that while on the ride, Cohen suffered a small tear in an artery going to his brain, which then led to a stroke a few weeks later. They claim the stroke was debilitating, according to the Sentinel.

Cohen’s injury lawsuit differs from other similar suits, in that there is no allegation that anything was wrong with the ride like an equipment failure or a code violation. Instead, the suit is claiming that the ride itself is a danger.

The Tower of Terror is a drop amusement ride. Based on the famous “Twilight Zone” TV show, the ride places guest in a large pod and gently takes them through a possibly “haunted” hotel. At the end, riders experience several short, vertical drops followed by a 13-story plunge.

Cohen’s personal injury lawyers attempted to make the case that the succession of movement and sudden drops can cause whiplash in even healthy individuals.

The lawsuit charges Disney with ignoring safety recommendations from their in-house advisers while building the ride, as well as failing to provide appropriate notice and warning of potential injuries that could happen.

“This case is about the placement of show or entertainment over safety,” Cohen’s lead attorney Barry Novack said during the opening arguments.

Disney’s head attorney Ron Cabaniss said evidence will show that the ride is indeed safe; is frequently tested and monitored for safety; was planned with care; and meets safety regulations, the Sentinel reported.

Cabaniss also said that the high speeds people presumably experience on the ride is largely an illusion supplemented by special effects, and therefore the ride doesn’t exert enough force on a human body to cause injury.

The Orlando Sentinel reviewed hundreds of personal injury lawsuits last year that were filed since 2004 against amusement parks in the central Florida area, including Busch Gardens and Seaworld. The newspaper reported that most of the cases were settled and dismissed and none went to trial.

A former high ranking officer in the Somali military, who now resides in Ohio, is the target of an injury lawsuit filed by a man who claims he was tortured in Somalia in 1988 at the hands of the former military official.

The suit was filed against Abdi Aden Magan, who served as a colonel and investigations chief for the National Security Service of Somalia. Magan served under the Somali dictator Siad Barre, according to the Associated Press.

Magan has been accused of authorizing the torture of Abukar Hassan Ahmed, who worked as a lawyer and human rights advocate.

Ahmed, who is now a resident of London, England said within the intentional injury lawsuit that for three months, he was beaten so severely that he feels pain while sitting and he also has trouble controlling his bladder.

The suit said Ahmed is suing because of “severe physical pain or suffering, the threat of imminent death, and the resulting psychological damage that persists to this day.” The lawsuit was filed in a U.S. District Court and does not specify an amount for damages, according to AP.

Andrea Evans, legal director of the San Francisco-based Center for Justice and Accountability, said that Ahmed’s case is an opportunity for him to let the world know details about what happened to him while in Somalia. Evans also said that several other similar lawsuits have been filed.

“We see it as a much broader call for justice than just financial gain,” Evans said. “It really is kind of telling history accurately.”

Magan was not immediately available to speak with the AP, and court records did not indicate an attorney working his case.

The injury lawsuit was filed under the Alien Tort Statute, a law dating back to the 1700s that can allow damages when international laws are broken, as well as the Torture Victims Protection Act.

The torture act allows non-U.S. citizens to file suits for torture or killings that happened outside the U.S., if the person accused of the crimes is living in the U.S. or owns assets that are within the country, according to AP.

The suit claimed that Ahmed was arrested on Nov. 20, 1988 and was held on the accusation that he was a writer for Amnesty International. The suit further alleges that he was given no food or toilet, and that soldiers beat him, choked him and crushed his genitals with metal devices.

Ahmed was released in March 1989, but then he was still harassed by security officers for the following four months until he left Somalia.

A personal injury lawsuit filed by a woman who claimed she was hit in the head with a coconut during a New Orleans parade was recently thrown out in court.

Daisy Johnson Palmer, 74, was looking for damage payments after she claimed that on Feb. 26, 2006, a hollowed-out coconut was lobbed at her, causing a bloody cut and further trauma, according to the New Orleans Times Picayune.

Palmer, a retired school teacher from the Jefferson Parrish area, sued the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club, who host the parade.

But four years later, an appeals court in Louisiana recently decided that her case was without merit and stopped the lawsuit from going to trial in the Orleans Parish Civil District Court. The injury lawsuit has been appealed and Palmer’s attorney Edwin Fleischmann said they are awaiting a decision from the state supreme court.

About 23 years ago, coconuts were added to a list of official items that are commonly thrown during Mardi Gras festivities in New Orleans where people are not able sue throwers for any injuries sustained from them, according to the Times Picayune.

Despite the state protection from injury lawsuits, people still can sue under the grounds of “gross negligence,” alleging that a float rider is acting in an inappropriate way that causes harm.

“They are not supposed to throw coconuts from the floats, and people get hurt,” Fleischmann said. “Zulu has written rules against this, and they did it anyway. If my wife or grandmother gets hit with a coconut, what do I care if it’s thrown overhand or underhand?”

Two videos were reportedly shown in court, but neither showed the actual coconut striking Palmer.

The Zulu group argued that they have a century-old participation in Mardi Gras, and that the parade during which Palmer claimed she was struck was the first celebration after Hurricane Katrina, where the group still was learning of members who were lost to the flood water.

“It’s hard to imagine anything more traditional than a Zulu coconut,” Attorney Tommy Hightower wrote in defense of the Zulu group. “They are trying to do people a favor; this is a very sought-after item.”

Namaan Stewart, vice president of the Zulu group, testified in court that he was using newer coconuts in 2006 that were lighter weight than ones in the past, and handing them to people calling for them, including Palmer.

Coconuts were added to the list of items that can be lightly tossed into crowds during Mardis Gras, including beads, cups and doubloons.

More than 150 different lawsuits against Toyota will be tried in one courtroom in front of a single federal judge in Santa Ana, Calif., including about 100 class action suits against the beleaguered Japanese automaker and another 50 personal injury lawsuits over claims of uncontrolled acceleration.

The ruling came down on April 9 from the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation, a panel comprised of seven judges charged with deciding whether the copious amount of lawsuits against the automaker could be tried in one shot, according to the L.A. Times.

Judge James V. Selna, who was appointed to the federal bench in 2003, will preside over the court hearing that will take place about 30 miles from Toyota’s headquarters in Torrance, Calif. The consolidated hearing will only include lawsuits that were filed in federal court against Toyota, and do not include state filings.

Toyota, who was once led hybrid vehicle sales with the Prius, is now looking down the barrel of an onslaught of litigation including personal injury lawsuits, wrongful death suits and class action filings. The suits all stem from findings that accelerator pedals can stick or malfunction causing the vehicles to suddenly accelerate.

Since September 2009, Toyota has been in the throes of its largest recall ever, including vehicles with the floor mat and accelerator problems, but also some Priuses with brake issues.

About 10 million Toyota vehicles have been recalled worldwide since the measure began last fall, according to the L.A. Times.

Late in March, the federal judge panel heard various testimonies from attorneys representing people who filed lawsuits against the automaker and from Toyota’s lawyers.

While a handful of plaintiffs’ lawyers made a case for each of the suits to be heard separately, a majority of attorneys on both sides of the ring argued that the overall process would be best handled by hearing the cases in one court room. The process of hearing multiple suits related to the same issue in one case is called multidistrict litigation, according to the L.A. Times.

“Centralization will create convenience for the parties and witnesses and will promote the more just and efficient conduct of this litigation,” wrote John G. Heyburn II, who served as chairman of the federal panel.

Most of the class action lawsuits are claiming economic loss from the recalls, wherein the resale value of Toyota vehicles people purchased before the recall have fallen.

The other lawsuits involve injuries and deaths that resulted from the equipment problems and motor vehicle accidents. While those types of cases are usually tried separately, the preliminary investigating into each case would involve overlapping, which is why the federal panel included them in the litigation.

A Philadelphia police officer is the target of a personal injury lawsuit that claims he fired his weapon after an off-duty night of drinking.

According to the Philadelphia Daily News, the lawsuit is charging Officer Thomas Schaffling with firing his weapon wildly around 3 a.m. on March 26 after leaving the an after-hours club in the Tacony neighborhood of Philadelphia. Schaffling was apparently upset that he couldn’t find his car, and began muttering obscenities before drawing his weapon.

“He was just firing wildly” Attorney Paul Messing said. “He seemed to be firing [bullets] all over the place and in their direction. It was just good fortune and Schaffling’s state of intoxication that no one was killed.”

Messing is the personal injury lawyer representing two men who claim they encountered Schaffling, 26, on the street after he left the bar, and that Schaffling threatened to kill them before he started shooting.

One of the men, 29-year-old Richard Checchia, was grazed under his arm by one of the stray bullets, according to the Daily News. Checchia was treated for the injury at Aria Health’s Frankfort campus and released.

The lawsuit, filed on behalf of Checchia and 28-year-old Stanley Dawlejko, names Schaffling, Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey and officers who responded to the scene all as defendants.

Schaffling, who has served on the police force for over seven years, has been the target of at least 14 different citizen complaints, many of which involving excessive force, according to the Daily News. He has also been a part of several high-profile police mishaps, including a videotaped beating of three people suspected in a shooting, an incident where officers used pepper spray and struck women and children at a baby shower and the accidental near-arrest of state Representative Jewell Williams.

In past incidents, people claimed that Schaffling brandished a weapon and threatened people with a violent death, according to the Daily News.

Messing said that the night of this recent situation with Schaffling he was yelling about not being able to find his car when Checchia and Dawlejko were about to get into Checchia’s vehicle.

Schaffling is accused of kicking in a fog light on Checchia’s vehicle and then threatening to kill the two men after he yelled that he was a cop. A witness has verified that he heard the threat, according to the Daily News.

Schaffling then allegedly attacked the two men before firing his gun. The suit further claims that officers who later arrived on the scene arrested Checchia and Dawlejko and held them for 18 hours, but didn’t charge them.

Schaffling, however, was not arrested or charged.

The family of a five-year-old boy filed a personal injury lawsuit against an Indianapolis indoor amusement park after the boy was severely injured on the mini tea cup ride.

Dennis Jennings and Antoinette Marion said their son Denzel Jennings suffered a fractured skull, among other injuries, after riding a mini-tea cup ride at the Xscape amusement park. He is now in a chemically-induced coma, according to the local Indianapolis NBC affiliate, WTHR.

“There’s nothing that you can really do to ease the pain from seeing your child sitting in the hospital like this,” Dennis Jennings said.

The lawsuit claims negligence against the Xscape park and Zoom Entertainment, who own the park. Within the complaint, the family says the park did not “reasonably and properly … inspect, test, maintain and operate the teacup ride.” The claim further alleges that staff members at the park were not observing the ride carefully enough.

Attorney Tom Doehrman told WTHR that witnesses can say they saw something malfunction with the ride.

“It shouldn’t move so fast, that his head actually, according to eyewitnesses, hit three times, hard enough to fracture his skull,” Doehrman said. “There’s some evidence that the cars would actually scrape against one another as they turned.”

State investigators said they have not found any proof of mechanical failure within the rides that might have led to Denzel’s injuries.

“At this time, the inspections that have occurred on the tea cup ride have not shown any type of mechanical issue that would have contributed to the young man’s accident,” Indiana Department of Homeland Security spokesperson John Erickson said.

Indiana State Fire Marshall Jim Greeson said only cosmetic violations were found on rides, such as cracks in fiberglass, but nothing considered life threatening. Greeson also said the tea cup ride was set to rotate the correct number of revolutions per minutes to be considered safe, according to WTHR.

The state DHS division, who is responsible for regulating and oversight of entertainment centers such as Xscape, did find out that the park was operating without a proper permit. While the park did have permits for individual rides, some of those were in violation as well.

The park was allowed to reopen on April 1st, under the condition that firefighters are on hand during operating hours to make sure the rides are functioning safely.

Representatives of Xscape did not comment on the injury lawsuit, but did offer their prayers for Denzel through a statement.

Management from the St. Louis-area City Museum used Facebook recently as way to voice discontent with a number of personal injury lawsuits filed against the museum.

On April 5th, museum management decided to voice their feelings through their Facebook fan page, acknowledging that the museum is a place where “kids and adults can run, jump, and play, that there is a risk for injury.”

But it was further written in the note that museum has taken active steps to post appropriate warning signs around attractions that can be dangerous, such as their seven-story slide. The museum staff has also grown tired of “people that see the museum as an opportunity to perpetuate insurance fraud.”

Within the note are a few examples of injury lawsuits filed against the museum. In one example, a rock fell from one of the interactive, installation pieces. In the note, City Museum says surveillance video showed no one came in contact with the rock. And yet, 12 people called the museum and claimed they were injured in the incident.

The note also pointed out that 75 percent of the lawsuits have stemmed from injuries adults have claimed to sustain at the museum.

City Museum Spokesman Rick Irwin told the Riverfront Times that he was the author of the note.

“Bob just got frustrated,” Irwin said about City Museum founder and owner Bob Cassilly. “The majority of the lawsuits are frivolous. People look at any opportunity. We actually have an employee here who was sitting in a coffeehouse the other day and this guy came up to him and said, ‘Do you wanna make a lot of money? See that wet floor? I’m gonna fall on it and you can be a witness.’ ”

A second note appeared on Facebook shortly after the first detailing three lawsuits filed by adults, two of whom said they were injured on a slide and another claiming to be hurt in the museum’s ball pit. Irwin told the Riverfront Times that Cassilly himself wrote the second note.

“2. Joli Sutter vs City Museum - You run and jump into the baby ball pit. Sign says ‘6 and under’ and ‘Do not jump,’” Cassilly wrote in the note.

According to the St. Louis area broadcast news station KMOV-TV, 26 injury lawsuits have been filed against the museum since 2004. Cassilly declined to specify how much the museum has paid out in damages and settlements.

As of April 8, 277 people liked the first Facebook note, while 91 comments were posted, many of which read positively about the museum.

Akon is a fixture on the pop music charts: More than 300 times has he made a guest appearance on a song that hit the Billboard Hot 100 charts.

His massive popularity makes him a hot commodity in concert, but his fans’ enthusiasm is leading to lawsuits against venue owners and tour promoters.

A recently filed personal injury lawsuits claims she was injured at an Akon concert last summer after the singer lept into the crowd, inciting a dangerous level of pandemonium among the crowd.

Holly Duncan claimed in a personal injury lawsuit that she was hurt during the Chicago-area B96 Summer Bash concert in June 2009, when a female attendee at the show fell backwards on top of her and her sister, reports the Chicago Tribune.

According to the suit, the 28,000 people in attendance at the concert went into an uproar after Akon dove into the crowd, causing the concertgoer to fall on Duncan.

The lawsuit points at the venue operators, the actual village the concert took place in and security crews as defendants, but Akon himself was not listed in the suit.

Local CBS affiliate WBBM, the village of Bridgeview, Monterrey Security Consultants, Andell Sports and Entertainment and Toyota Park were all named.

The suit claims that during Akon’s performance, people crowded the aisles within Toyota Park rather than remaining in their assigned seats and concert staff and security did not do anything to stop that activity.

Duncan’s suit further claimed that Akon leapt into the crowd four times during a song within about a four minute period, which caused large shifting among the swells of people near where she and her sister were attempting to watch the show.

The suit doesn’t specify what the extent of her injuries were, only reading that Duncan “sustained personal injury, has and will in the future sustain pain and suffering, disability and disfigurement.” There are also claims in the suit that Duncan will need continuous medical treatment for her injuries and that she will have to “pay sums of money for hospital care and attention.”

Duncan asked for $50,000 apiece from each of the defendants named in the lawsuit.

The suit accuses WBBM of being negligent, both by not setting up proper safety measures at the show for crowd control and not responding to the crowd once people started acting in an unsafe manner. Monterrey Security, Bridgeview and Andell face similar charges within the lawsuit.

Toyota Park is charged with not providing a safe location to see the concert.

The suit does say that Akon caused a “crowd surge that was dangerous for persons lawfully attending the concert” when he dove off the stage, but he nonetheless was not named a defendant.

The family of a woman who died after she struck her head during a fall while ice skating at a city rink in Irvine, Calif. recently filed a $10 million claim against the city that could lead to a wrongful death lawsuit.

The claim filed on behalf of Cherlynn Tang, who died in February at the Great Park ice rink, claims the city did not maintain a safe enough skating rink for visitors. Tang fell while skating with her teenage children, according to the Orange County Register.

The personal injury lawsuit alleges that Tang fell backward in a puddle of melted water on the skating rick, and as a result she sustained a fatal head injury. The claim reads that aside from not maintaining a safe skating rink, the city also didn’t have necessary emergency medical care ready to help and didn’t incorporate safety rules for the rink, according to the Register.

Representatives from the city declined to comment.

An attorney representing the Tang family said the lack of on-site medical personnel contributed to a 20-minute delay from when Tang fell to when emergency staff could tend to her.

“Clearly the city of Irvine had absolutely no idea what they were doing here,” Attorney Ed Susolik said. “They had no safety precautions, no medical personnel there, no training. What do you do when someone gets injured? These are basic responsibilities that business owners have.”

Tang was injured around 12:30 p.m. on February 14, toward the end of a 45-minute skating session, according to the Register. Attendees had just been instructed to leave the rink when the accident happened.

Tang was treated at the rink by paramedics and then she was taken to Western Medical Center in Santa Ana, Calif., where she was pronounced dead from personal injury two days later.

City officials said recently that Tang had not been wearing a helmet when she fell, and that helmets were an option available to all people visiting the rink. Safety monitors were also on hand during the skating sessions, according to the officials

The Tang family’s lawyer argued further that the city should not have kept the rink open during weather warm enough to melt the ice, and said the melting led city staff to resurface it about every hour.

“Ice skating is an activity you do when it is 40 or 50 degrees outside,” Susolik said. “You don’t build an ice rink on a beach in Hawaii, and then get surprised when people fall.”

A personal injury lawsuit was filed against former Detroit TV broadcaster Fanchon Stinger and her former boyfriend after their Ferrari hit a man on motorcycle.

David Sugg filed the injury lawsuit earlier this month against the two after he was struck in May 2007 by a Ferrari coupe while he was riding his motorcycle. Sugg is asking for at least $25,000 in damages from the two people, according to the Detroit News.

According to the lawsuit, Rayford Jackson, the incarcerated former boyfriend of Stinger, was driving the Ferrari owned by Stinger at the time. The suit claims Jackson was driving on an interstate highway when he swerved toward Sugg who was riding a motorcycle.

The Ferrari struck Sugg’s motorcycle, causing Sugg to lose control of the bike and fall off, hitting the highway surface at speed, according to the Detroit News Free Press.

The five-page car accident lawsuit filed by 37-year-old Sugg names both Jackson and Stinger as defendants. Stinger was named because she was the legal owner of the vehicle and is liable for damages, according to Sugg’s attorney Eric Berkley.

“It’s an action for injuries,” Berkley said.

Within the suit, Sugg claims the crash caused injures to his “head, neck, back and body, arms, legs” and that the crash also exacerbated a pre-existing condition. The suit did not indicate what that condition might be. Sugg also listed shock as well as lingering physical and mental pain from the crash.

The suit further claims that Sugg has required continuous medical treatment, which included therapy for mental suffering, along with medication and doctors’ expenses for physical ailments.

The lawsuit is the latest in a series of troubles for Stinger that stem from her relationship with Jackson.

The Detroit News Free Press says that Jackson was a well-connected businessman when the two started dating. But a bribery scandal ruined his career, and took Stringer’s down with it.

Last November, Jackson was sentenced to five years after he pleaded guilty to giving former Detroit City Councilwoman Monica Coyers at $6,000 to sway her tie breaking vote, according to the Detroit Free Press. The bribe was to ensure Jackson’s contract would receive a $1.2 billion sludge contract from the city.

Stinger left the local Fox2 station after Jackson was implicated, due to her connections both to him and to his company, Synargo.

According to the Detroit News, Stinger claimed Jackson had purchased fancy cars such as a Rolls Royce under her name, because he has bad credit.

Michael Jackson’s father will likely file a wrongful death lawsuit against the man working as the singer’s personal doctor at the time of Jackson’s death.

Joe Jackson, Michael’s father, is expected to file the personal injury lawsuit within the next three months, according to NBC Los Angeles. One of Joe Jackson’s attorneys, Brian Oxnard, informed various media outlets on March 30 that he has sent a legal notice to Dr. Conrad Murray letting him know that Joe Jackson intends to file the wrongful death lawsuit.

One of the more controversial aspects of Michael Jackson’s death involves a powerful anesthetic called propofol the singer was using under the advice of Murray.

Oxnard told NBC the frequency and amount of the drug administered to Michael Jackson before his death “was reckless and amounts to second-degree murder.”

“The continuous administration of drugs over six weeks — he (Murray) gave him propofol every night — that is Russian roulette, that is loading six bullets into a gun with only six chambers,” said.

Murray has also been heavily scrutinized for the alleged delay between finding Jackson unconscious and calling for help. Oxnard also accuses Murray of waiting too long, and that such an action also contributed to the singer’s death, according to NBC Los Angeles.

“The bottom line is, had paramedics gotten there earlier and had they been called right away, chances are he could have been revived,” Oxnard said to the Los Angeles Times previously.

Notices about the wrongful death lawsuit came after the Associated Press found out that one of Michael Jackson’s staff members went on record about Murray delaying in calling emergency personnel.

Michael Jackson’s logistics director Alberto Alvarez told investigators that Murray had stopped performing CPR on Jackson to hide vials of drugs, according to NBC Los Angeles.

Murray’s defense attorneys argued back that Alvarez had not made any mention about Murray delaying to call 911 or stopping CPR in previous testimony to investigators.

Murray’s lawyers said they had not received any notice from Oxnard about a wrongful death lawsuit, and would not comment on the notice until it was received.

The 90 day notice is legally required and a wrongful death lawsuit must be filed within a year of a person’s death, Oxnard said. He also said there was not sufficient evidence before to file a suit, but now there is.

“Having records, instead of just speculation, has been very important and hard to do, but we (now) finally have the records so we can tell what happened,” Oxman said.

Since his son’s death, Joe Jackson has been involved in other legal wranglings, most notably over the pop star’s will.