In order for any subject to be fully understood, it’s necessary to start with a basic understanding. When dealing with personal injury claims it can be extremely difficult — as an accident lawyer can explain — due to physical discomfort and even pain, but with the help of an attorney you can make up for the damages you’ve suffered. Premises liability helps to determine who is at fault in the situation and helps to resolve tension or confusion regarding who is to blame.
What Is Premise Liability?
Premise liability laws are laws regarding personal injuries that occur on another person’s property. In some situations the property owner is at fault and in other cases they are not; according to our friends at the Brandy Austin Law Firm, just because an incident occurred on the property does not mean it is the owner’s fault. In premise liability laws there is clarification regarding what duties property owners owe to their visitors. These clarifications help to determine who is at fault in the event that someone is injured.
How Do These Claims Work?
In order for a premises liability claim to be carried out it must contain specific elements. These elements are; a legal duty was owed, that duty was breached, and damages were caused by that breach of legal duty.
In order to prove a legal duty was owed we need to first know who the owner of the property is. If you are at a place such as a grocery store or restaurant then the owner and/or operator of the restaurant must ensure that their place of business is safe for customers and other visitors. That is what would be considered the “legal duty” that they owe, ensuring that there are no hazards to cause damage to any visitors. If the place you are in is residential then the owner owes what’s called an “ordinary duty of care”. This is the standard of care that a reasonable person would act in the same way under those circumstances.
Once it has been determined that a duty of care was owed, you must then prove that the duty was breached due to negligence. To be considered negligent you must have fallen below the standard level of care for the specific situation. If a landlord is aware of a broken sidewalk and does nothing to fix it and down the line a person trips and is injured, then the landlord has breached their expected duty of care that is owed.
Finally, if you were injured you must show that you were injured due to the hazard and not anything else. For example, if you were to trip and fall at your apartment complex while you were responding to emails on your phone, you would have to prove that you fell due to the aforementioned broken sidewalk and not due to the lack of attention paid to watching where you were walking.
Do I Have To Go To Court?
In most premises liability cases it is not necessary to go to court, in some cases it may turn out that it’s needed but typically premises liability cases can be settled outside of court. When a premises liability claim occurs you would normally file with insurance first and then your lawyer can help with negotiations. A lawyer can be very helpful in these situations in order to make sure that you get a fair settlement amount for the amount of pain you’ve suffered. After all is said and done hopefully you will have been compensated for your struggles and physical damages caused by negligence. These premises liability claims can be difficult but an attorney can help you through each step and get you what you deserve. If you believe you are facing a case like this, contact an attorney near you for help.