Slip or trip and falls can happen in any number of locations. They can occur outside on public and private land or in buildings and stores. These cases can also occur on common carriers and vessels. At first blush, these cases may seem simple. However, depending on how and where they occurred, very different issues arise. The law applicable to these types of claims is very different depending on where they occur and whether the defendant is a governmental agency. Your attorney will need to identify all of the defendants that may be liable for a particular fall which can be a very difficult task if the injury occurs in a building or a mall where many corporate entities may have ownership, operating or maintenance rights. If your attorney is not schooled in this area of law, you may find out when it is too late, that the actual at fault defendant has been overlooked and was never sued. Therefore, you must be sure to choose your attorney wisely.
Moreover, this area of law raises some very interesting and complicated issues. Your attorney must be well versed in the applicable law and various Governmental Codes that may apply to your case. If your attorney fails to recognize that certain laws or codes apply to your case, your case may be weakened or even dismissed. These cases are oddly complicated and can often require the testimony of an expert witness. It is important for you to hire a lawyer that fully understands the nuances of this field of law. Our firm has litigated many interesting and intricate cases that deal with the law applicable to injuries resulting from this type of accident.
Finally, it is very important for your attorneys to be well versed in medicine in order to make sure that they are arguing the right damages and seeking the appropriate level of recovery. We have been involved in numerous circumstances where clients have come to us after speaking to other attorneys who have failed to understand or recognize the significance of certain medical findings. If this occurs in your case, you may recover far less money than you are entitled to and may even learn after settlement, that you need future treatment that was not contemplated before the settlement. It is imperative that your attorney be sophisticated in their understanding of the medicine because they will be dealing with doctors and will have to be educated in the type of inquiry that will fully demonstrate the extent of their client’s injury. The physicians often do not have the time to try to educate a lawyer that is not highly skilled in these matters. Further, the information obtained from the doctors is often only as good as the questions asked by the lawyer. Doctors are in a different line of work then your lawyer and do not think the same way as a lawyer regarding what evidence is needed to prove your case. Therefore, a lawyer sophisticated in the medicine will more fully explore your injury and obtain the intricacies of the medicine that a jury will need to hear during a jury trial. Our firm is highly qualified in these types of claims and medicine.