Articles Posted in Premises Liability

A number of our posts have focused on who can be held liable in an accident, and what the injured person may be able to recover in terms of monetary damages. But in the midst of pursuing compensation for an injury, many plaintiffs may not realize that there may be a continuing duty for the plaintiff to mitigate their damages.

Essentially, this means that a person who has been injured due to someone else’s negligence has an obligation to take reasonable steps minimize the effects of the injury. This may include getting medical treatment and following a doctor’s advice regarding rehabilitation regimens. It may also include restricting one’s employment duties (i.e. not lifting a certain amount of weight while recovering or limiting the number of hours standing up). It may also include having a particular surgery to reduce the damage of an ailment. 

What qualifies as reasonable steps is determined by what a reasonable prudent person would do to avoid the ongoing damages of an injury, or to expedite the recovery process. If an injured person fails to mitigate damages, he or she could be denied the entire amount of compensation they could be entitled to.

Part of resolving a premises liability claim involves investigating it. This includes gaining information that the property owner (or ownership group) is likely to rely on in marshalling a defense a plaintiff’s claims. The process of obtaining such information is called discovery, and it is a critical part of litigation.

Through discovery, your attorney will obtain information such as:

–           Who would be responsible for providing insurance on the day the accident occurred?

The place that is dubbed “the happiest place on earth” may have been anything but joyful for a number of people who contracted measles while at Disneyland and its adjacent park, Disney’s California Adventure. According to a recent USA Today.com report, health officials linked the outbreak to patrons who attended the park between December 15 and December 20.

For the uninitiated, the measles virus can be highly contagious. Health officials indicate that the virus can hang in the air “like a ghost” for up to two hours, even though it does not speak on surfaces. As such, it is not suspected that the park could be dangerous for patrons. Additionally, if a person has been vaccinated (as many children in the United States have been), the measles virus is not likely to pose a threat. Since the infected patrons visited the park nearly a month ago, it has been deemed safe for the public.

Nevertheless, the outbreak does raise questions about a theme park’s liability for spreading contagious diseases. On a threshold level, a park (or any other public venue, for that matter) has a responsibility to take reasonable steps to keep public areas free of contaminants that can spread disease. Essentially, there is a duty to sanitize areas where diseases can fester and become dangerous to the public.

There are a number of dangerous jobs in New York. From working on a construction site to protecting the public as a police officer, jobs that come with a certain amount of risk are completed every day without people being injured. However, accidents do happen, and when they do, an injured worker may be able to assert their rights and seek compensation.

Indeed, the first question an injured worker should ask themselves (or at least a lawyer) is whether the accident is covered under workers’ compensation laws. In many industries, the exclusive remedy for injured workers is to file a claim. However, depending on the circumstances, a worker may file suit to seek damages through a negligence or wrongful death claim.

Such is likely the case for the loved ones of an elevator worker who was killed while doing maintenance on an elevator in Manhattan. According to a recent nbcnewsnewyork.com report, the man was in the elevator shaft when an empty elevator came down three floors, and pinned the man underneath. The weight of the elevator crushed the man to death.

Living with treacherous sidewalks and parking lots is a way of life in upstate New York. After all, with all the snow that we receive during the winter (and unfortunately sometimes during the spring) you would think that store and building owners would know that they have a legal duty to keep entry ways and parking lots reasonably free of snow and ice.

Unfortunately, it does not always happen that way. Because of this, pedestrians are injured in slip and falls during the winter. However, as the old adage says, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. With that, we offer some helpful tips for pedestrians as they navigate icy sidewalks, entryways and parking lots. 

Make storeowners aware of dangerous conditions – As we alluded to earlier, property owners have a duty to take reasonable steps to make ingress and egress safe for customers. However, if they are not put on notice about dangerous conditions, it may be difficult to establish liability for an owner who does not know that such conditions exist.

In what is poised to be the biggest shopping weekend of the holiday season, retailers appear to be ready to pull out all the stops to bring out shoppers. A number of stores are advertising their willingness to stay open continuously until Christmas Eve, and others are rolling out big discounts to get people off of their couches and into the stores.

In essence, it is almost like retailers are trying to top Black Friday sales, since this year’s bonanza appeared to fall flat given the additional spending money consumers should have given lower gas prices. But given the hype about “Super Saturday” we feel it prudent to discuss the obligations that retailers have to keep consumers safe.

Essentially, retailers are charged with taking reasonable care to ensure that consumers are not harmed as they shop on a retailer’s premises. This means that they must keep aisles free of debris and spills, heavy merchandise should be placed in areas where they will not fall on unsuspecting consumers and crowd control must be in place to ensure orderly ingress and egress from the store.

To the most fanatic shopper, Black Friday (and in some cases, Gray Thursday) is like the Super Bowl of shopping dates. There are likely weeks of planning and training, as well as time taken out to stake a spot for the most coveted of deals. For what is probably a thrill to get a fabulous deal may also come with substantial danger. After all, there is a story every year about someone getting injured in a Black Friday sale.

So when a patron is injured in these situations, can the retailer be held liable? Of course, it depends. 

As a matter of law, retailers have a duty to keep patrons safe from hazards while shopping on the retailer’s premises. Essentially, they have to use reasonable care in keeping customers from being injured by hazards they knew about or should have known about. Common hazards include spills, broken glass and flooring that has become unstable.

Ithaca is a beautiful city and the Cornell campus has great views of its lovely gorges. Those gorges, however, have recently become the subject of a premises liability lawsuit following a Cornell student’s death. Though the student did commit suicide, the young man’s parents are alleging that both the school and the city were negligent in not doing more to prevent people from jumping or falling off of the bridges crossing the gorges.

While many people think of premises liability lawsuits as slip-and-fall cases, that is not the only kind of injury for which a plaintiff can collect. Any time someone is injured on a piece of property because of another’s negligence, he or she can file a premises liability lawsuit. Typically, this is seen when a person falls inside or outside of a store, but it can cover things like a dog bite at a private residence, an unmarked hole on a piece of property, an elevator injury, or, as in this case, a student’s suicide.

The young man’s parents are suing both Cornell and the city of Ithaca for not doing more to prevent “jumpers.” It is not as if this student’s suicide was the first. In a span of 20 years from 1990 to 2010, 27 people died after jumping into Cornell’s gorges. In the 2009-2010 school year alone there were six suicides. This young man committed suicide in February 2010.