The Nakatani Law Group

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My new website . Making progress. Next up new office in Newport Beach .

Big happenings here at the Nakatani Law Group. Ben and his applicant/plaintiffs clients have joined the firm of Glauber/Berenson. The office in Norwalk will remain open to service the Los Angeles, Orange County and Inland Empire for Glauber/Berenson. As for me, I'm taking over The Nakatani Law Group, which will now defend employers, insurance carriers and third party administrators in all aspects of workers' compensation litigation throughout Southern California , including Serious & Wilfull and 132a claims . The new Nakatani Law Group will be setting up offices in Newport Beach . More details to come ....

HOLLYWEED INDEED: THE RECENT BUZZ ON THE LEGALIZATION OF MARIJUANA AND THE EVER TROUBLED WORKERS COMPENSATION SYSTEM. With the recent passage of Proposition 64, which legalized recreational use of marijuana in California, the burning question is how will this work with employers, workers, and the workers compensation system? Employers are conflicted with drug-free workplace policies, employees do not want to be singled out or discriminated against for exercising a State...Continue reading

CONTINUOUS TRAUMA DRAMA: WILL CONTINUOUS TRAUMA CLAIMS, KNOWN AS C.T.’S, BE THE NEXT BLOW AGAINST INJURED WORKERS AND BE ELIMINATED IN THE NEXT ROUND OF REFORMS? There has been a recent concern in the workers’ compensation community that continuous trauma (CT) claims will be eliminated from the California Workers’ Compensation System. In a recent study conducted by the California Workers’ Compensation Institute (CWCI), they determined a strong association between attor...Continue reading

SPORTS INJURIES IN CALIFORNIA AND WORKERS’ COMPENSATION: WILL FUTURE CONCUSSION PROTOCOLS APPLY IN WORKERS’ COMPENSATION OR JUST CREATE MORE CONTROVERSY IN AN ALREADY FAILING SYSTEM? Professional athletes in California, although probably have pretty good health insurance, are still entitled to workers’ compensation benefits for work related injuries. There has been a lot of media in the past few years about the NFL cases involving head/brain trauma from concussions, but it ...Continue reading

SAN BERNARDINO CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW? A FOLLOW UP It works my friends, we have to continue to use our voices to be heard and that’s exactly what happened. In follow up to my prior post regarding the San Bernardino terror attacks and the shameful conduct of the County’s workers compensation administrator denying medical care/treatment to the victims, Eloise Reyes (D-San Bernardino) wasted no time by introducing Assembly Bill 44 which purports to exempt medical treatment for su...rvivors of acts of terror or violence in the workplace from delays in having the request for authorization reviewed and appealed. This is a start and one in the right direction. I was glad to see this is not being limited to only acts of terror and includes violence in the workplace. This will help all victims of workplace violence in getting the help and treatment they desperately need and deserve. You may recall a couple of years back there was a workplace shooting at a local SCE facility. Those workers went through similar horror. In this day and age of workers frustrated, fed up, and pissed off almost anything is possible in or at the workplace. Let’s hope this piece of legislation gets approved. If not, we can only expect more of this shameful behavior from all employers and their greedy insurance carriers which means we will have to continue our fight!! Ben H. Nakatani, Jr., Esq. The Nakatani Law Group Injured Workers Attorneys www.thenakatanilawgroup.com Advocating for the Injured and Disabled

A CALL TO LABOR AND INJURED WORKERS' TO UNITE Last week Labor took to the streets of Los Angeles demanding higher wages because reality is happening now and we cannot wait for the laws to catch up to reality. The minimum wage increase needs to happen now! Costs are continuing to increase on everything and as every new law passes, taxes go up to pay for it. Enough is enough! When will this stop? Will we get to a point where we have to just sign over our entire paychecks? ... At some point you think, what’s the point of working if you can’t make a living? It’s happening all over the country, just do a ‘labor search’ on the internet. Union leaders are organizing strikes, people are organizing protests, and people are fed up. In another recent news story, there is a Labor Report that was urging Federal Oversight due to State’s failing workers’ compensation systems. The article said, "Working people are at great risk of falling into poverty," the agency says in a new report on changes in state workers' comp laws. Those changes have resulted in "the failure of state workers' compensation systems to provide [injured workers] with adequate benefits." This is our wakeup call people. But the words united we stand and divided we fall never meant so much to an issue such as this one. We must unite! We must stand together! We must do so and take the fight to the steps of the Capital and the doors of our local leaders. Only when they see the numbers will we get their attention and bring the possibility of change. If not, we need to vote in new leaders that will listen and make changes. Clearly we are not getting anywhere with the leaders in place now. If we don’t stand up together for change, how can we ever expect a change to ever occur? Ben H. Nakatani, Jr., Esq. Workers Compensation Attorney Norwalk, California www.thenakatanilawgroup.com Advocating for the Injured and Disabled

So sad on The one year anniversary

S.B. TERROR VICTIMS NOW TERRORIZED BY COUNTY WORK COMP DEPARTMENT It’s happening my friends, are we just going to continue to take it or are we ready to unite and do something about it? Do what you ask? Unite and finally take our fight to the doors of our local politicians and fight for a change. Fight for what’s right. Fight for what needs to happen to make things right for labor and injured workers! Ok, now that I got your attention, this is what I’m talking about. Fir...st, late November the story of the San Bernardino workers that were victimized by the terror attack in December last year are not getting the medical attention and treatment they desperately need and deserve. The County of San Bernardino is hiding behind technical rules of the State’s workers’ compensation system, or should we really be saying non-compensation system, to deny medical care and treatment. This is ridiculous and should be embarrassing to the County of San Bernardino. If there was ever any exception to override the technical rules on medical care and treatment, this is it! If this cannot be considered an exception, then I have no idea what would ever be considered an exception. This is supposed to be a benefit delivery system but the reforms of late are taking away more and more benefits and making it more difficult than ever before to get basic benefits. Insurance carriers or self-insured employers always have the right to override or waive a provision in the Labor Code that would otherwise deny an injured worker benefits. But, you will note there is nothing in the news articles or online that discusses that point. Only that the treatment was denied by the technical rules to review requests for medical treatment. B.S.!! That’s just a cop-out! County of San Bernardino do what’s right!! Take care of your employees and treat them with the respect and dignity they deserve. I cannot believe in this day and age we even have to ask or demand for this to be done. It is not surprising however, the last San Bernardino employee I represented for a work injury case, I had to fight for every penny as the County’s self-insured provider played hardball the entire case and it too was an accepted injury case. I had to take the case to trial and a first level appeal to fight for my client’s benefits. It shouldn’t have to be this way. Ben H. Nakatani, Jr., Esq. Workers Compensation Attorney http://www.thenakatanilawgroup.com Norwalk, California Advocating for the Injured and Disabled