What Types of Accidents and Injuries Are Frequently Involved in Premises Liability Lawsuits?
Premises liability basically holds a property owner liable for accidents or injuries occurring on their property. As a result, premises liability lawsuits can involve a very wide range of incidents, including:
- Slip and fall injuries
- Collapsing structures
- Swimming pool/drowning incidents
- Assaults or shootings due to lack of security
- Poor lighting at apartments or other complexes
- Injuries from sharp objects
- Toxic exposure
- Various other types of personal injury accidents
There are many other different kinds of accidents that premises liability law covers. You may need to contact and hire a lawyer if you were injured on another person’s property and are unsure of who may be responsible.
At Pierce Skrabanek, our premises liability attorneys have a proven track record of holding the proper parties responsible and obtaining significant damages awards on behalf of clients.
Is Premises Liability the Same as Negligence?
Premises liability and negligence are not the same. Premises liability refers to situations where a property owner can be held liable for injuries to others who are on their property.
Negligence is the legal theory that is typically used to prove premises liability. Negligence happens when a person fails to exercise the care they are reasonably expected to show others, with such failure causing injury to another person.
In the context of premises liability, negligence typically takes the form of the property owner or manager failing to take specific precautions, such as failing to make sure there is adequate security on the premises.
To prove a premises liability claim based on negligence, it must be shown that:
- The property owner owed a duty of care to the person who was injured on the property
- There was an unsafe or dangerous condition on their property
- The property owner knew about the dangerous condition, yet failed to fix or address it; and
- The property owner’s failure to prevent the incident was the cause of the person’s injuries and measurable damages
As a general example, suppose that a property owner knew that a pool deck on their property was about to collapse. If it collapses while someone is standing on it and they get injured, it could form the foundation for a premises liability case.
There are varying levels of duty that the owner must abide by, as will be shown in the following section. These depend on the way the visitor relates to the property.
You may be entitled to damages if you were hurt on someone else’s property and they failed to take the required steps to secure your safety.
How Does the Duty of Care Apply in Premises Liability Cases?
Premises liability cases are so complex because the property owner may owe a slightly different duty of care to people who visit their property. This depends on many different contextual factors.
The main idea is that the duty of care depends on whether the person was invited, what their purpose was being there, and whether the property owner had an opportunity to fix potentially dangerous conditions.
There are three basic types of visitors. A property owner owes a different duty of care to each of them:
Invitee: This is a person that the property owner invited to enter their property for any lawful reason.
Examples: Friends who were invited to another’s house, hotel patrons, store customers, and people attending a sporting event.
Duty of Care: A property owner may be held liable if they knew or should have known about the dangerous condition if they had exercised “reasonable care” in inspecting their property. The owner has a duty to warn all invitees of such risks; they also have a duty to inspect their property for dangers that could harm the invitee.
Licensee: This is a person allowed to be on the property for their own benefit, and who remains present at the owner’s consent.
Examples: A utility worker who enters the premises to repair an electrical wire, a friend who stops by uninvited and enters the owner’s house, or someone who the owner granted permission to hike on their land.
Duty of Care: Similar to invitees, the owner is liable if they had reason to know of any dangers, and failed to take steps to correct the hazard. They also have a duty to warn the licensee; however, they typically don’t owe a duty to inspect the premises beforehand.
Trespassers: This is someone with no legal right or permission from the owner to enter the property.
Examples: A burglar, a person hunting on a plot of land without permission, or someone loitering after hours at a construction site.
Duty of Care: Property owners are generally not responsible for injuries trespassers sustain on the property. They also don’t have a duty to warn them of hazards or inspect their land to make it safe.
These categories will differ according to state law; in addition, there may be exceptions to these rules. For example, property owners generally don’t need to warn trespassers of dangers; however, they also typically can’t set booby traps to injure them.
So, sorting out damages and liability can be very confusing if you were injured while on someone else’s land or property. Thus, it’s in your best interests to hire a lawyer who can research the laws in your area and determine what your options are in terms of damages.
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