Slip and fall injury cases and trip and fall injury cases are classified as premises liability cases. All property owners, residential and commercial, have the duty to ensure safe environments for all visitors. If you have been harmed by a hazardous condition on another’s property including a sidewalk, personal residence, restaurant, mall, hotel, office building school, park, theater, or museum, you may be eligible to file a premises liability claim and receive compensation for your injury. These “Slip and Fall” injuries most commonly occur from uneven or slippery surfaces but can also be the result of:
- crumbling stairs
- wet floors
- exposed electrical wiring
- raised flooring
- falling debris
- obstructed pathways
- poorly lit walkways
Examples of Our Premises Liability Cases
The New York personal injury Law Offices of Effie Soter, PC represents people seriously injured and the survivors of those killed in a wide range of premises liability claims, including:
- Pedestrian or passerby injuries at job or construction sites
- Retail Store Injuries
- Public Building Injuries
- Restaurant Injuries
- Injuries from collapsing stairwells or porches
- Faulty handrails, elevators or escalators that lead to serious injury or death
- Injuries to tenants
- Rape, robbery or assault on private or public property
- Swimming pool injuries
- Amusement park injuries
- Cases against New York landlords for unsafe/unsecure property that leads to serious injury or death
- Cases against businesses in instances where falling overhead products injure customers
- Injuries to customers of New York businesses
Slip and Fall Accidents On Icy Surfaces
Property owners are responsible for taking the necessary measures to remove snow and ice from their property, including sidewalks and parking lots. Property owners are permitted a reasonable amount of time after a snow storm ceases to remediate any snow or ice accumulation. However, if the property owner opts to remove snow during a snow storm, reasonable measures must be taken by the property owner to ensure that they do not create a hazardous dangerous condition.
Even after a snow storm has ceases and the initial snow and ice has been removed, a property owner must remain on top of any residual snow and ice and provide any necessary maintenance.
Proving Your Premises Liability Claim
Every premises liability claim is unique and fact specific. If you are involved in a slip and fall accident, we recommend that you try to take photographs of the defect that caused your fall. Often times, a slippery condition is temporary and will be cleaned up by the property owner after your fall.
If your accident occurs within a store, whether a department store or a grocery store, you should complete an accident report. An accident report can be obtained by asking the store manager for a report. This report will allow you to tell your version of the events that led to your fall and injuries. If possible, you should obtain a copy of the accident report before you leave the store.
If there is a witness to your accident, try to obtain their name, address, and telephone number. The information that they possess may be vital to your premises liability claim.
In addition, we recommend preserving the item that caused your fall. For example, if you were caused to fall because of food debris, pick-up the food debris and place it in a plastic bag and preserve the item by placing it in your freezer. We also recommend that you preserve the shoes that you were wearing at the time of your fall.
For a property owner to be held liable for the injuries that you sustained as a result of their negligence, one of the following conditions must be true:
- The property owner or their employee caused the dangerous condition to exist which resulted in your accident.
- The property owner or their employee must have possessed acutal notice (actual knowledge) of the dangerous defective condition and failed to take any steps to properly correct the defect.
- The property owner or their employee had constructive notice (“should have known”) of the dangerous defective condition and failed to take any steps to correct it.
In a premises liability case, time can be of the essence as certain valuable evidence could be easily lost if the right steps are not taken. If you are unable to take any photographs or obtain any witness statements, our team of experienced premises liability attorneys will obtain as much information as possible to further your claim. Most premises liability claims have a three years statute of limitations. If your injury involved the City, the State, a municipal agency, or a state agency, a Notice of Claim has to be filed within 90 days of your accident.
Call Us to Learn How We Can Help
When property owners fail to provide safe conditions, innocent visitors can be seriously injured or killed and have a right to be compensated for medical bills, pain and suffering, lost wages, disability and other issues arising from the injury. Our Attorneys can advise you about your options. We undertake premises liability cases on a contingency fee basis. If we accept your case, there is no fee unless we recover damages for you. For a free initial consultation with a New York premises liability lawyer, please call our office at 646-504-7384 or contact us online.
Although premises liability law seeks to protect parties who are injured as the result of the property owner’s negligence, it is often difficult to prove liability especially if the owner has corrected the hazardous condition. To ensure that the proper grounds for your claim are met, you should contact our knowledgeable personal injury attorneys who have the resources and experience necessary to help you collect compensation for medical expenses, lost wages, pain and suffering, and even emotional trauma.
Our personal injury law firm can assess your injury and assist you in determining whether the property owner failed to maintain his or her property or properly warn of hazardous conditions. For your claim to be successful, it must be shown that the property owner knew about the hazardous situation and failed to correct it in a timely manner and that the action or inaction of the property owner caused the condition which led to your fall.
Once liability has been established, we will work with you in proving a direct causal relationship between the hazard on the property and the injury that you suffered. A myriad of other factors including visitor status must also be considered when filing a premises liability claim. Visitor status explains your reason for the visit to the property. If you are an invited guest your claim may hold more weight in court, whereas a trespasser may not be able to receive any compensation for his injuries.
Our compassionate injury attorneys consider all of these factors and will represent you aggressively so you can take care of what is most important—recovering from your injury and regaining your health.
Call a New York City Premises Liability Attorney
The New York personal injury lawyers at The Law Offices of Effie Soter, PC offer initial free appointments to discuss your rights. Call an attorney at 646-504-7384 to learn more about premises liability.
DISCLAIMER: This site and any information contained herein are intended for informational purposes only and should not be construed as legal advice. Seek competent legal counsel for advice on any legal matter.