Was Your Injury Due to Negligence?

Negligence is the basis for almost all Phoenix personal injury lawsuits, from wrongful death to slips and falls. What is negligence?

A person is “negligent” when he or she does not take reasonable care under the circumstances to protect others from harm. A person is liable for an injury if he or she was negligent in causing an accident. Their liability results from careless or thoughtless – in other words, not intentional – conduct or, in some cases, a failure to act when a reasonable person would have acted.

How do you determine if someone did not meet the standard of reasonable care? The first part of the analysis is what would be reasonable care in a particular situation. Some cases are simple: failing to stop at a stop sign, failing to control a biting dog, failing to clean up a dangerous spill in a supermarket aisle. Other cases may be less obvious. For example, if a tree branch falls on your car, it might seem like an accident. But if your neighbor had been warned that the branch was dead and hanging off the tree, his failure to have the branch removed may be negligence. Would a reasonable person have taken care to have the branch removed? If the answer is yes, then your neighbor may have been negligent.

The injured person must also prove that the negligent conduct caused his injury. This too may be obvious – being hit by the car running a stop sign, for example. There may, however, be other situations which are not as clear cut. Some circumstances require the assistance of various types of experts to explore and explain causation.

Who determines if someone has been negligent? In a trial where there is a question as to whether the defendant has been negligent, either the jury or, in a trial without a jury, a judge, will make that determination. Both sides in the lawsuit will present their evidence, the plaintiff to prove that the defendant was negligent and the defendant to prove that he was not negligent, either because he did not breach the duty of care that he owed to the plaintiff or that his conduct did not cause the injury.

Although each case depends on its own unique set of facts, there is one thing common to all negligence cases: you need the help of an experienced, skillful Phoenix injury attorney.

Article provided courtesy of Attorney Jess A. Lorona, Attorney at Law, 866-606-0951, www.arizonatrialattorneys.com.

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