If you’ve been in a slip-and-fall accident outside a store in Fort Myers, FL, you may be able to bring a claim against the store owner or manager if there were unsafe conditions that contributed to your fall. A slip-and-fall lawyer can help you gather the evidence you’ll need to show what happened.
Evidence You Need in Your Fort Myers, FL Slip-and-Fall Claim
The best evidence in these cases will usually be:
- Photos of the scene
- Incident reports
- Eyewitness statements
- Video surveillance footage
- Medical records
- Internal reports
- Complaints to the city
Proving Liability
All the evidence you collect goes towards showing negligence to prove that the store is liable. You have to prove the store had a duty of care to keep you safe, failed in this duty, and that this failure was what caused (or significantly contributed to) your accident. Then, you have to prove precisely what you’ve lost as a result of the accident. Your losses are called “damages” in legal parlance.
Why It Can Be Tricky
If your fall took place at the storefront, in other words outside the store itself, the question becomes precisely what the store owner or manager’s duty was regarding that area. The store owner or manager does have a duty to keep that entrance area safe and either fix hazards or warn visitors about them. But because the area is outside, exposed to the elements, it’s important that you be able to prove actual or constructive knowledge on the part of the store.
Actual Knowledge
Actual knowledge means the store owner or manager had seen or been told about a hazard.
Constructive Knowledge
Constructive knowledge means the store owner or manager should have known about a hazard, either because it had been there long enough that it should have been discovered in the due diligence of keeping the store in order, or because it was a regularly occurring hazard.
PProving constructive knowledge requires showing that the hazard had been there a while or that it was often a problem. For example, if there’s an area at the entrance to the store that regularly becomes slick when wet, the store should have been putting out warning signs every time it rains. But if that area was slick because a visitor to the store spilled their drink on it 15 minutes before you fell, and the day was dry, the store owner likely won’t be found liable.
Common Defenses
Three of the most common defenses that stores in these cases use are:
- Comparative fault: you are at least partially to blame
- Lack of notice: the store wasn’t aware and couldn’t have reasonably been expected to be aware
- Open and obvious danger: a reasonable person taking basic precautions would have avoided the danger
Talk to a Slip-and-Fall Lawyer
As you can see, it can be tricky to prove liability in these cases. Call us today at Goldstein, Buckley, Cechman, Rice, Purtz, Smith & Smith, P.A. for help with your case in Fort Myers, Naples, Cape Coral, Lehigh Acres, or Port Charlotte.