You may have grounds to seek compensation if you got hurt at a store or on someone’s personal property. While compensation is not guaranteed, it may be worth seeing what you can access with a Denny Terrace premises liability lawyer. A Denny Terrace personal injury lawyer at Shelly Leeke Law Firm may help you navigate the steps and gather evidence to see if you have a case.
Premise Liability in South Carolina
Premise liability refers to the responsibility of property owners to maintain safe area conditions for visitors. Property owners have a duty under state law to protect invitees from dangerous conditions that exist on their land. If injury occurs because of negligence in maintaining safe premises, the landowner may face legal liability.
Under South Carolina law, premise liability cases involve injury to a visitor that was caused by failure to address a safety hazard on one’s property. Hazards may include things like wet floors, poor lighting, broken stairs, unattended pets, or other unsafe conditions that the landowner knew or should have known about. Landowners must take reasonable care to find out about potential dangers and correct them or provide adequate warning.
If a visitor is injured by an unsafe condition on someone’s property in South Carolina, the landowner may be considered negligent and held financially accountable. Not all injuries on someone’s property would be the fault of the property owner; there are several factors to see who is at fault. Factors like the hazard and whether it would normally be anticipated can help determine if the property owner did not tend to all risks.
Proving Negligence
To successfully prove negligence in a South Carolina premise liability case, you will need to demonstrate that the property owner failed to take reasonable care. This requires showing that a hazardous condition existed, the landowner was aware or should have been aware of the danger, and the hazard directly caused the injury in question. The visitor must establish all elements for the courts to find the owner negligent.
A lawyer can help demonstrate the landowner breached their duty of care by identifying precisely what safety hazard led to the injury. This may involve factors like poor lighting, untreated ice, excess clutter, or other risks that existed due to oversight. Expert testimony is often useful for corroborating that the property owner neglected to act reasonably, given the foreseeable danger.
By proving both the existence of an unsafe condition and that the landowner did not take appropriate precautions, an injured visitor can succeed in a negligence claim. Documenting the specific hazard is step one and an important step. Next, you will need to show how the property owner should have reasonably discovered and corrected the risks or, at minimum, provided warnings prior to the accident occurring.
Common Places Premise Liability Accidents Occur
Premise liability accidents often happen in locations owned by businesses that serve the public, like retail stores, restaurants, hotels, medical offices, or other establishments. Owners of these commercial properties have substantial responsibility for safety maintenance to protect invitees from harm. Parking lots, lobbies, aisles, restrooms, and stairwells are common areas that require vigilance.
Injuries frequently result from unsafe conditions outside private residences as well. Homeowners must address risks on driveways, decks, porches, pools, gardens, garages, basements, attics, and other parts of their property that visitors can access. Taking reasonable care to prevent accidents in all these locations is key.
Public spaces like parks, playgrounds, trails, campgrounds, transportation hubs, and recreational facilities can also prompt premises liability claims if harmful conditions exist. Governments or other entities overseeing such areas must act to protect well-being by proactively identifying and mitigating foreseeable risks that lead to injury for visitors. Contact Shelly Leeke Law Firm to work with a premises liability attorney in Denny Terrace to see if the property owner could potentially be at fault.
Different Types of Premise Liability
Premise liability cases generally fall into one of three categories, depending on the relationship between the injured visitor and the property owner. Invitees, or paying customers, are owed the highest level of care on safe property conditions under South Carolina law. Licensees, or social visitors, have lesser but still protected legal rights while on private property, and uninvited trespassers have very limited property owner obligations.
Invitee accidents are among the most common premises liability cases, as they include customers of any business establishment, like stores, office buildings, restaurants, or hotels. These property owners must make reasonable efforts to protect paying guests whom dangers could foreseeably harm. Failing to address known or visible risks can prompt negligence claims by injured invitees.
Licensees such as dinner guests or others on private property through an invitation still have basic safety rights. Homeowners should provide adequate warning of non-obvious hazards or make reasonable corrections to known dangers to visitors. Carelessness causing licensee accidents can prompt accountability concerns as well.
Potential Compensation You May Go After
Economic damages are often claimed in injury lawsuits. This type of compensation will usually cover quantified losses like medical costs, lost wages, and other out-of-pocket costs that can be evidenced with documentation. Non-economic damages may also be sought for difficult-to-quantify aspects like pain and emotional distress.
Exact potential compensation varies case by case and is never guaranteed. Economic damages in injury lawsuits can include current and future medical expenses, rehabilitation costs, property damage, lost income, and other calculated financial impacts like household help. Documented evidence helps establish these tangible losses and leads to a potentially better outcome.
It is important to carefully track all related costs following an accident, both now and in the future. Also, document non-economic impacts on your life, work, activities, and emotional well-being. Thorough records will help your attorney seek fair damages, though results cannot be precisely predicted and depend on legal factors.
Work with a Denny Terrace Premises Liability Attorney
Whether your injury happened at a public store or at the private premises of someone’s home, you can see if your situation has merits for a case. Working with a premises liability lawyer in Denny Terrace can see what potential you may have. Contact Shelly Leeke Law Firm for a free consultation.
