Hurt on Someone Else’s Property?

A Miami Injury Lawyer at Hickey Law Firm, P.A. Can Help

At Hickey Law Firm, P.A., a Miami accident lawyer serving the state of Florida can help if you have suffered an injury on a property other than your own. Property owners have a legal obligation to ensure that their grounds are safe and don’t pose an unreasonable risk to individuals. If you or someone you love has been injured on a property as a result of an unreasonable danger, contact our Miami law office today. A Miami injury lawyer who handles premises liability cases throughout Florida can review your case and advise you of your rights.

Premises Liability Lawsuits

Premises liability includes two types of situations. First, there are dangerous physical conditions that cause accidents. This includes spills on floors, as well as improperly designed stairs or ramps that may cause trip and falls or slip and falls. Second, there are negligent security situations. This is when the owner of a shopping center, supermarket or other business knew, or should have known, of security problems and risks in the area or on the property and did not take the necessary steps to make the property safe and secure.

If you have been injured because of unsafe physical conditions or a negligent security situation at a grocery store, mall or shopping center, or on a cruise ship or any other property belonging to someone else, you may be entitled to compensation. An experienced Miami accident lawyer at Hickey Law Firm, P.A. can determine if you have a premises liability claim.

Preventing Slips and Trips

The rules of safety for preventing accidents are simple. First, a cruise line, shopping center, grocery store or other business should actively look for spills. Second, when a spill occurs, they should guard the area immediately. Someone or something should be placed near the spill to warn people walking through the area. Third, they need to clean up the spill immediately. If the area remains wet, the area should be blocked off by chairs, ribbons, rope or other means. Cones should be put up in the area to warn people that the area is wet. If the area is slippery when wet, it should be dried, or if the area has thick traffic where people cannot see the warning cones, perhaps because they enter the area by rounding a corner, the area should be blocked off.

The National Safety Council and the American Association of Safety Councils have outlined several rules concerning accident prevention. For instance, you can reduce the risk of slipping on wet flooring by:

• Taking your time and paying attention to where you are going
• Adjusting your stride to a pace that is suitable for the walking surface and the tasks you are doing
• Walking with your feet pointed slightly outward
• Making wide turns at corners
• Wearing the proper foot gear
• Taking small steps to keep your center of balance under you
• Walking slowly and never running on slippery surfaces
• Keeping both hands free for balance, rather than in your pockets
• Using handrails from start to finish
• Avoiding carrying loads on stairways
• Avoiding carrying loads that you cannot see over
• Keeping your eyes on where you are going
• Testing potentially slick areas by tapping your foot on them
• Stepping, rather than jumping, from vehicles and equipment
• Keeping walkways clear of debris, water, ice and slippery materials

Furthermore, you can reduce the risk of tripping by:

• Always using installed light sources that provide sufficient light for your tasks
• Using a flashlight if you enter a dark room where there is no light
• Ensuring that things you are carrying or pushing do not prevent you from seeing any obstructions, spills, etc.

When these helpful hints don’t work, and you know you are going to slip, try to reduce your potential injury when falling by:

• Rolling with the fall — try to twist and roll backwards, rather than falling forward
• Relaxing as much as possible when you begin to fall
• Tossing the load you are carrying — protect yourself instead of the objects being carried

If you or a loved one suffered injuries during a slip and fall or trip and fall, contact our Miami law office today and learn how an experienced Miami accident lawyer at our firm can help.

Design Rules for Floors and Stairs

The rules for designing safe floors and stairs are also important. These rules are well recognized by national and international organizations and by the engineers and industry representatives who created the rules. The rules are based on basic ergonomics, that is, the study of the average human being’s interactions with the environment. These rules can be found in building codes, such as the South Florida Building Code, the numerous standards of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), and all applicable statutes, standards, regulations, and model codes, including but not limited to:

• ASTM International standards (including ASTM Standard F 1637-95 “Standard Practice for Safe Walking Surfaces”)
• Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) standards and regulations
• American National Standards Institute (ANSI) standards
• International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers (STCW) and the Seafarers Training, Certification and Watchkeeping Code
• International Maritime Organization (IMO) guidelines and standards, including but not limited to Guidelines on Fatigue and Labour Standards on Merchant Ships
• United States Coast Guard Navigational Vessel Inspection Circulars (NVIC)
• Code of Federal Register (CFR) sections
• Florida Statute sections
• United States Code sections, regulations of governmental agencies and trade organizations
• National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) codes
• Life Safety Code
• Florida Fire Prevention Code
• South Florida Building Code sections
• Florida Building Code sections
• Standards promulgated by the International Code Council, including but not limited to the International Building Code and the International Mechanical Code
• Americans with Disabilities Act Accessibility Guidelines

Although there are many organizations with standards for floor and stair design, the standards are fairly uniform. For example, the height of steps and the length of the tread of steps must follow certain guidelines. Moreover, a step should be flat and smooth and not contain any lip or bulge that can cause someone to trip.

Floor and stair design standards apply to every single building and ship. The architects who design buildings and ships all learn these standards and know that a step or floor structure designed outside these standards will likely be unsafe.

Cruise lines that have ships registered in foreign countries say these laws do not apply to them. However, the International Safety and Management Code (ISM Code) does apply to them.  The ISM Code references industry accepted standards. Certainly, these standards are expected in the cruise industry. Further, these safety rules are developed according to the laws of ergonomics, i.e., how human beings react to the physical world. Those laws do not change whether you are in a building or on a ship. What is safe in a building is safe on a ship.

If unsafe flooring or stairs injured you or a loved one, let an experienced Miami injury lawyer at Hickey Law Firm, P.A. evaluate your case today.

The Defendant’s Responsibility

In premises liability law, the defendant’s responsibility to the victim varies depending on the victim’s classification. There are three different classifications for the plaintiff in premises liability cases: invitee, licensee and trespasser.

• Invitee — An invitee is anyone who is invited to enter or remain on the premises for a commercial benefit to the property owner or for business dealings with the property owner. For example, a customer in a department store is considered an invitee.
• Licensee — Licensees are those who are invited to enter or remain on the premises for reasons other than business or commercial, such as social guests. A property owner has less obligations to a licensee than an invitee, but should still take due precautions to ensure their safety and well-being.
• Trespasser — A trespasser is any individual who enters a property without an express or implied invitation for his or her own purpose. When a property owner is unaware of the presence of the trespasser, they usually do not have to warn the trespasser of existing dangers or make their property safe for the benefit of the trespasser. If the property owner is aware of the presence of the trespasser, he or she may be obligated to exercise care concerning the safety of the trespasser.

The bottom line is that anyone in a grocery store, in a shopping center, at the mall or even on a cruise ship is an invitee. A property owner, cruise line or mall owner owes to everyone on its property an obligation, responsibility and duty to provide a safe place.

In Florida, there is a statute regarding the obligations of commercial property owners. That statute, Florida statute section 768.0710, states that commercial property owners and cruise lines act negligently by failing to exercise reasonable care in the maintenance, inspection, repair, warning or mode of operation of the business premises. It also states that the failure of a commercial property owner or cruise line to exercise reasonable care is a legal cause of the loss, injury and/or damages suffered by an injured person.

In premises liability cases, the injured person has to provide some evidence that the business owner or cruise line either created the dangerous condition or, if the dangerous condition existed for a period of time, that the business owner or cruise line should have known about it. What does this mean? This means that, in the case of steps being too steep, a lip or a bulge on a stair, or a floor surface that is excessively slippery, the injured person must demonstrate that the building owner or the cruise line created that condition and/or knew, or should have known, about it. Some specific examples of such situations include:

• In the case of mopping a floor, obviously the property owner knows the floor is unsafe while it’s wet from mopping
• In the case of an ice or water machine being broken, the property owner or cruise line has control over that — they know, or should know, about the dangerous condition the broken machine creates
• In the case of someone spilling a drink on the floor, if the drink remains there for an excessive period of time — longer than 15 minutes, for example — and no one cleans it up and blocks off the area, then the store owner or the cruise line is responsible for any slip and fall caused by the spill

A business owner can be held liable for a spill-related injury, because a grocery store, mall or cruise ship is a place where people — sometimes hundreds or thousands — walk through certain areas on a constant basis. Further, the grocery store, mall or cruise ship sets up displays, signs and things for sale in order to grab the attention of the people walking through. This means that the people walking through have their attention devoted to somewhere other than the floor. For this reason, it is essential that areas where people walk remain safe at all times, which means cleaning up spills quickly.

If you have been injured, a Miami and Fort Lauderdale injury lawyer from our Florida law firm can review your case and determine liability. Contact our Miami law office today — serving Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach County, Miami-Dade County and beyond.

Compensation in a Premises Liability Case

Property owners and business owners have a duty to maintain their property in a way that makes it safe for visitors. A store failing to post signs warning customers of wet floors, a fall caused by unsafe conditions, construction site accidents or assaults by employees are all examples of premises liability. Additional examples of premises liability include:

• Uneven floors
• Slippery surfaces
• Broken sidewalks or steps
• Unmarked changes in elevation

If any of these conditions are present, it may be grounds for proceeding with a personal injury claim.

Contact a Miami Injury Lawyer Who Handles Premises Liability Cases in Florida

If you have been injured on another person’s property or a commercial property as a result of negligence or wrongdoing, you may have a premises liability case. To schedule a free consultation in the Miami area with a premises liability attorney, contact our Miami law office today. Miami accident lawyer John H. (Jack) Hickey has the experience and wherewithal you are seeking and can help protect your rights.

OUR MISSION is to provide to you, the honest, seriously injured person, the advice you need, the representation you want, and the compensation you deserve. By doing this, we correct unsafe places, procedures, conditions and products on cruise ships, stores, commercial facilities, at work and at home.

We represent honest, seriously injured people in cases of personal injury, wrongful death, cruise ship accidents, maritime accidents, boating accidents, aviation and airplane crashes, slip and falls, trip and falls, car accidents, truck accidents, product liability, medical malpractice, professional negligence, wrongful prescriptions, sexual assault, assault and battery and negligent security.

We fight for people who have suffered wrongful death or injuries with permanent impairments or disabilities, such as orthopedic injuries, which include broken bones or torn ligaments or tendons; injuries to the organs; neurological injuries; traumatic brain injury, which can cause brain damage; burn injuries; psychological injuries from trauma or scarring and disfigurement.

If you or a loved one sustained injuries on someone else’s property and believe negligence or wrongdoing may have been involved, learn about your rights from an experienced Miami accident lawyer at Hickey Law Firm, P.A. To schedule a free, no-obligation consultation, contact our Miami law office today.