In Fort Lauderdale, on October 15, 2001, Oral Brown was driving his SUV when he had a seizure and crashed through a fence in a flea market. When paramedics arrived, Brown was either unresponsive or combative, resulting in emergency medical staff cuffing his hands behind his back and binding his ankles together with legs bent behind him and wrists also tied to ankles. He was then strapped face down on a stretcher and transported to the local hospital where emergency room physicians unsuccessfully revived him.

The autopsy report states that Brown died due to accidental "positional asphyxia," which means he was unable to breathe in his position on the stretcher. The man's family is currently suing those involved in his rescue for malpractice. This lawsuit has shown a crack in some of the reports, exploited by the deposition transcripts of two individuals.

According to the homicide report, Glenn Bukata, a homicide detective for the county, interviewed the first responding paramedic Ken Loukinen after the incident. The report shows that Loukinen told Bukata that he saw the victim unresponsive and suspended from the seatbelt and then he placed a cervical collar around his neck, which is when the driver "became combative."

But, according to the South Florida Times, the official deposition transcripts rebuke this event as never happening. Furthermore, the detective's video deposition tapes corroborate this.

According to the tapes, when Loukinen was asked about the cervical collar, his memory gets a little fuzzy, saying that they may have had it on afterwards and that he doesn't recall.

While this case may be an outlier, it shows that having accurate and high-quality realtime court reporters can be the difference between one verdict and another. If lawyers in the Midwest wish to ensure that their clients are represented as best as possible, they may want to partner with Milwaukee court reporters that also offer video deposition transcripts.

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