Slip & Fall Premises Liability Attorney Foley & Small

Premises liability and slip and fall cases arise where a visitor is hurt due to a dangerous condition on land owned or rented by another. Examples of common premises liability cases include:

• Slip and Fall. A restaurant or store fails to mop up a wet floor or to clear an entryway of snow and ice, and a customer slips and falls.
• Inadequate Maintenance. A landowner fails to maintain the premises in such a way as to avoid injury to the public, such as when a gutter leaks near a doorway and ice forms on the pavement from the leak causing one to slip and fall.
• Defective Conditions. An apartment complex owner fails to repair or warn of a dangerous condition on the premises, such as when a set of concrete steps decay and crumble and a person falls due to the uneven surface or the loose debris.
• Inadequate Security. A parking garage company fails to install adequate lighting or to patrol to prevent criminal activity taking place on the premises.

Foley & Small has handled premises liability cases falling into all of these categories. Foley & Small is well acquainted the law applicable to such claims and is experienced and able to identify and obtain the information necessary to obtain the best outcome for our clients.

Premises Liability Law

If a person is injured on the property of another, a court will impose liability on the property owner or possessor if (1) the property owner or possessor owed the injured person a duty of reasonable care and (2) the property owner or possessor acted negligently in maintaining or otherwise using the property. Whether the property owner or possessor owed the injured person a duty of care, as well as the extent of care owed, depends on the relationship between the person owning or holding the property and the injured person.

Invitee

An invitee is a person who is invited upon the property to conduct business with the possessor or is invited for another purpose, such as to attend a social gathering. Typically, possessors of property owe invitees the highest duty of care. Under Indiana law, an owner owes a business or social invitee the duty to exercise reasonable care to ensure they are exposed to an unreasonable risk of injury.

Licensee

A licensee is a person who has the consent of the owner to be on the property, but is not on the property for a purpose that benefits the owner financially or socially. For example, if a landowner is asked and consents to another hunting on the property, the hunter would be a licensee. The owner of the land is not liable for any defects in the condition of the land and he or she does not have the duty to maintain his premises in a safe condition. The only affirmative duty a landowner owes to a licensee is to refrain from willfully or wantonly injuring licensee or acting in a way that would increase the licensee’s peril.

Trespasser

Property owners owe the lowest duty of care to trespassers. A landowner owes a trespasser the duty to refrain from willfully or wantonly injuring him or her. However, with regard to children, Indiana courts long have recognized that landowners may sometimes owe a higher duty of care, even when the children are trespassers. The attractive nuisance doctrine recognizes that a child may be incapable of understanding and appreciating all of the possible dangers that may be encountered in trespassing.