• Cruise Ship Accidents
• Cruise Ship/Yachting Accidents
• Admiralty and Maritime
• Cruise Ship Assault
• Railroad Accidents/FELA
• Personal Injury
• Car Accidents
• Wrongful Death
• Medical Malpractice
• Incorrectly Filled Prescriptions
• Defective Products
• Premises Liability
• Brain Injury
• Injuries
• Commercial Litigation

• Follow us on Twitter
• Find us on Facebook
• Find us on LinkedIn
• Find us on YouTube
• Read our Blog

At Hickey Law Firm, P.A., a premises liability attorney 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. An attorney who handles premises liability cases throughout Florida can review your case and advise you of your rights.

• Premises Liability Lawsuits
  • Compensation in a Premises Liability Case

Premises Liability Lawsuits

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

The rules of safety for when accidents occur are simple.  First, a cruise line, a shopping center, a grocery store, should actively look for spills. Second, when a spill occurs, they should guard the area immediately.  Someone or something should be there at the immediate area of the spill and warn people walking through the area.  Third, they need to clean it up 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 warning the area is wet.  If the area is slippery when wet, it should be dried or if the area has thick traffic where people would not see the cones because they are coming around a corner to enter the area, the area should be blocked off.  These rules are recognized by the National Safety Council and the American Association of Safety Councils:

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 the feet pointed slightly outward, and
• 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 fun on slippery surfaces.
• Keeping both hands free for balance, rather than in your pockets.
• Using handrails from start to finish.
• Avoid carrying loads on stairways; or carry loads that you can see over.
• Keeping you eyes on where you are going.
• Testing potentially slick areas by tapping your foot on them.
• Step - Don't jump from vehicles and equipment.
• Keeping walkways clear of debris, water, ice and slippery materials.

You can reduce the risk of tripping by:

• Always using installed light sources that provide sufficient light for your tasks or,
• Using a flashlight if you enter a dark room where there is no light, and
• 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:

• Roll with the fall. Try to twist and roll backwards, rather than falling forward.
• Relax as much as possible when you begin to fall.
• Toss the load you are carrying. Protect yourself instead of the objects being carried.

The rules for designing safe floors and stairs also important. These rules are well recognized by organizations and by engineers and industry representatives that create the rules. The rules are base on basic ergonomics. That is the study of the average human being on the environment. The rules are in the building codes, such as the South Florida building code, the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and all applicable statutes, standards, regulations, and model codes including but not limited to:

• ASTM Standards (including ASTM Standard F 1637-95 “Standard Practice for Safe Walking Surfaces”)
• OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) Standards and regulations
• ANSI (American National Standards Institute) standards
• STCW (International Convention on Standards of Training Certification and Watch keeping for Seafarers and the Seafarers Training, Certification and Watch keeping Code)
• IMO (International Maritime Organization) guidelines and standards including but not limited to Guidelines on Fatigue and Labour Standards on Merchant Ships
• NVIC’s (United States Coast Guard Navigational Vessel Inspection) Circulars
• 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.

There are many organizations.  However, the standards are fairly uniform.  The height of steps and the length of the tread of the steps are standard.  The step should be flat and smooth and not contain any lip or bulge of which can cause someone to trip.

These standards apply to every single building and ship.  The architects who design buildings and ships all made these standards and know that the design, a step, or a structure outside these standards, would make the stepper structure unsafe.

Ship cruise lines which have ships which are registered in foreign countries say that the 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 industry.  Further, these safety rules are developed according to the laws of ergonomics of 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 on a building is safe on a ship. 

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. The property owner, the cruise line, the mall owner owes to everyone on their property an obligation, or responsibility or duty to provide a safe place.

In Florida, there is a statute which applies the obligations of the owner of the mall, shopping center. That statute, Florida statute section 768.0710 states that the owners or cruise lines acted 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 the owners and/or cruise line to exercise reasonable care was a legal cause of the loss, injury, and/or damages suffered by injured person.

The injured person has to provide some evidence that either the owner of the mall or the cruise line created the dangerous condition or that the dangerous condition existed for a period of time such that the cruise line or mall or business owner should have known about it. What does this mean? This means that, in the case of the steps being too steep, of a lip or a bulge on a stair, a floor surface which is excessively slippery, the building owner or the cruise line created that condition. They knew or should have known that the condition was dangerous.

In the case of mopping the floor, obviously the property knows about that condition.

In the case of an ice or water machine broken, that the property owner or cruise line has control over that. They knew or should have known about the condition it created.

In the case of someone spilling a drink on the floor, if the drink remains there for an excess period of time, for example longer than 15 minutes, 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 which causes that. This is the law because a grocery store, mall, or cruise ship is a place where people, sometimes hundreds or thousands, walk through the area 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 key that the conditions or the area are safe.

A Miami-area personal injury attorney from our Florida law firm, serving Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach County, Miami-Dade County, and beyond, can review your case and determine liability.

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

Contact an Attorney Who Handles Premises Liability 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 Florida law firm today. 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.

Representing 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 represent these people in cases where they 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, head and brain injuries, burn injuries, psychological injuries from trauma, or scarring and disfigurement.