Charlotte Slip and Fall Lawyer

If you’ve been injured in a slip and fall accident, a Charlotte slip and fall lawyer can help you to recover full compensation. Remember, if you’ve been hurt due to someone else’s negligence, you are owed monetary damages; you should not be responsible for the medical bills and other expenses resulting from an accident caused by another person’s carelessness or inattention.

After reviewing your case, our slip and fall attorney can take a comprehensive look at all of the ways an injury has affected your life and pursue appropriate damages. Compensation may be available for:

• Former, current, and future medical bills and therapy costs
• Lost wages if your injury caused you to miss work
• Diminished earnings if your injury prevents you from performing the same job
• Pain, suffering, and mental anguish experienced
• Loss of quality of life.

If a defendant demonstrated egregious carelessness or disregard for safety, our slip and fall lawyers in Charlotte may pursue punitive damages that are meant to punish a defendant for blatantly unsafe actions and disregard for safety.

Actions to Take after a Slip and Fall Accident

Recommendations from Slip and Fall Lawyers in Charlotte

After a slip and fall accident, receiving appropriate medical attention should be your first priority. However, as your condition permits, completing other actions can help protect your injury case and position you well to obtain compensation. Follow these recommendations from our slip and fall attorneys in Charlotte.

• Obtain Medical Attention – After an accident, it’s critical to seek medical attention. If you’re unable to call 911 or travel to an emergency care facility, have a bystander call. Obtaining a full medical evaluation can reveal the extent of your injuries and will also provide needed evidence. When pursuing damages, a medical report of your injuries is key.
• Gather Evidence – As you are able, take photos of the accident scene. Try to remember and record any details about your surroundings and the hazard that caused your accident. If there were any eyewitnesses, ask for their contact information, as they may provide testimony later on. Document the events leading up to your slip and fall accident. Note where you were going, what you were doing, and other pertinent information.
• Reporting Your Accident – If you’ve been hurt, notify a property owner or building manager of your injury. If you’re unable to do so, ask a bystander to notify the appropriate person. When notifying an owner or manager or recounting events, it’s important to stick to the truth. But be sure you obtain treatment and a proper medical evaluation before speaking about your condition.

Contact a Slip and Fall Law Firm Right Away

As soon as you’re able, contact a slip and fall law firm. Slip and fall injury attorneys are ready to hear more about your case and assist you with filing a personal injury claim.

Time is of the essence, because it won’t be long before a property’s insurance company contacts you. Insurance adjusters are trained to minimize what your claim ultimately costs the insurance company they work for. You can assume that anything you say to them as well as all of your actions following your accident will be used against you to either devalue your injury claim or provide a basis for the insurance company to deny your claim altogether.

As soon as you have slip and fall lawyers in Charlotte on your side, they can handle insurance adjusters and negotiations. Let our attorneys fight for you and ensure that your case has the greatest chances for full and fair compensation.

How Can a Slip and Fall Attorney Help Me?

Our Slip and Fall Injury Attorneys Fight for You

Pursuing litigation against a negligent property owner requires working with a Charlotte slip and fall lawyer who’s attentive, caring, and dedicated to you and your case. Even if your case does not go to trial, a slip and fall attorney will be an essential asset in evaluating your case and in making sure your compensation is both fair and adequate.

Some of the many processes and legal steps that our slip and fall lawyers in Charlotte can help with are described below.

Filing Your Case

Any personal injury claim and lawsuit will involve no shortage of legal processes, paperwork, and deadlines. Our slip and fall injury attorneys can handle these steps while you focus on recovery. Further, errors in case processing or missed deadlines can negatively impact the outcome of your claim. You don’t want an oversight or paperwork mistake to jeopardize your case; let us handle those processes.

Building Your Case

An experienced slip and fall law firm knows how to build a strong personal injury case that successfully recovers compensation for clients and holds negligent parties responsible. Doing so involves collecting evidence to support your case. Slip and fall attorneys in Charlotte collect evidence by:

• Reviewing injury reports, medical evaluations, and other documents
• Speaking with accident witnesses
• Documenting and investigating an accident scene
• Checking a property’s history for former violations or pertinent findings
• Reviewing surveillance footage when available.

Our Charlotte slip and fall lawyer can collect, analyze, and use evidence to support your claim and build a strong case for your recovery.

Negotiate on Your Behalf

Insurance companies working for properties bearing hazardous conditions are typically reluctant to offer adequate compensation to injury victims. Even if a property owner accepts responsibility for an accident, insurance companies do their best to make sure that they pay injury victims as little as possible. However, our slip and fall attorney can negotiate with insurance companies and a defendant’s lawyers so that you receive compensation that appropriately covers all of your accident-related expenses.

Prepare for Trial

If a defendant does not accept responsibility for negligence that led to your accident, it may be necessary to take them to trial. Similarly, if an insurance company refuses to pay adequate damages, filing a lawsuit and taking your case to court are next steps. While litigation is often used as a last resort to obtain damages, our slip and fall lawyers in Charlotte can represent you in trial and deliver a strong argument for your compensation.

Common Causes of Slip and Fall Accidents

Numerous unsafe conditions in and arounds stores, businesses, public properties, and private residences can lead to slip and fall injuries. It is important to determine whether you fell as a result of an unsafe condition and someone’s negligence.

However, it’s important to be aware of common causes of slip and fall accidents, both for your safety and to make sure that you pursue an injury claim if you’re injured as a result of any of these unsafe conditions:

• Freshly waxed, washed, or slippery floors
• Torn or ripped carpets and rugs
• Standing water and spills
• Snow, ice, and slush on sidewalks, steps, entranceways, and other areas
• Loose cords and other tripping hazards
• Uneven surfaces such as cracked sidewalks or damaged floorboards
• Dim or inadequately lit areas
• Broken, missing, or crumbling steps
• Loose or unsecure handrails
• Holes, pits, or drop-offs in the ground or floor.

While still other unsafe conditions can lead to slip and fall injuries, use caution if you encounter any of the above conditions or hazards.

Slip and Fall Cases and the Law

When people are injured on others’ property, North Carolina premises liability laws dictate who’s responsible. Slip and fall injury cases are among the most common types of cases that fall under premises liability law.

Negligent property owners fail to maintain safe premises. Slip and fall injury victims should be compensated fairly and fully for others’ negligence.

In North Carolina, property owners have a legal duty to keep their premises in safe condition. Spills should be promptly cleaned up. Stairs should have solidly affixed railings. Dark passageways should be illuminated. When guests visit the premises, the property must be free from hazards, and owners have a duty to warn guests of any known dangers.

The Elements of a Slip and Fall Injury Case

Successful slip and fall injury cases must demonstrate negligence. An injured person is entitled to damages if the person who caused the injury negligently breached a duty of care owed to the plaintiff. In slip and fall cases, failing to maintain safe premises exemplifies a breached duty to look out for guests’ safety.

Slip and fall injury attorneys look for four legal elements underlying a legitimate slip and fall injury case:

1. A property owner had a legal duty to properly maintain the premises or warn visitors of an unsafe condition.
2. The owner failed to properly maintain the premises or warn visitors of this unsafe condition.
3. The property owner’s failure to properly maintain the premises or warn of the unsafe condition resulted in an injury.
4. Damages sought are a result of the injury.

Contributory Negligence

North Carolina law follows a contributory negligence doctrine. This means that if plaintiffs contributed in any way to their accident, they are then barred from recovering any damages. Even if a plaintiff is only 1 percent at fault for his or her accident, no monetary damages can be recovered.

North Carolina is one of the few states to adopt and follow such a strict doctrine. (Most states follow a comparative negligence doctrine, whereby a plaintiff’s responsibility for an accident reduces—but does not eliminate—the compensation he can recover.)

Don’t let a defendant try to blame you for a slip and fall accident. Our slip and fall attorneys in Charlotte can help hold property owners responsible.

Because North Carolina follows such a strict negligence regulation, defendants will try to shift blame onto a plaintiff and thereby owe no compensation. That is why it’s imperative to enlist the help of an experienced, knowledgeable slip and fall law firm whose attorneys can build a strong case for you.

Slip and Fall Accidents in the Workplace

In factories, in warehouses, and in practically all other workplace locations, slip and fall accidents can occur. However, unlike a slip and fall injury that occurs in a store, business, private residence, or other type of property, workplace accidents involve workers’ compensation.

Workplaces can be especially dangerous. Construction accidents, accidents involving machinery and equipment, and other types of dangerous accidents and hazards exist in many sites and places of work. Yet slippery, wet floors and other unsafe conditions and tripping hazards are not uncommon.

If and when a worker slips, falls, and suffers an injury in the workplace—be it a construction site or an office—a workers’ compensation claim, rather than a personal injury claim, will provide a first avenue for pursuing compensation.

FAQ

Common Questions for a Charlotte Slip and Fall Lawyer

Our slip and fall attorneys in Charlotte often receive questions about aspects and processes related to personal injury claims and premises liability. Below are several questions that our lawyers often hear.

For other questions, and to learn more about how our Charlotte slip and fall lawyer can help you, give us a call at (704) 377-3770 and schedule a free consultation to discuss your case.

Injured on Someone Else’s Property? Our Slip and Fall Attorneys in Charlotte Want to Help.

If you’ve suffered a slip and fall injury on someone else’s property, you should not have to suffer financially on top of your pain and suffering. By contacting our Charlotte slip and fall lawyer, you can begin the process of filing an injury claim to recover monetary damages that you are owed.

Property owners have a legal responsibility to keep their premises in safe condition and to warn any visitors of hazards. However, negligent property owners who permit unsafe conditions can be held responsible if a visitor slips and falls.

The slip and fall injury attorneys at the Sumwalt Anderson Law Firm have the legal knowledge and acumen needed to help you build a strong case for full and fair compensation if you’ve been injured by a fall. We’ve helped numerous injury victims obtain the damages that they’re owed, and we would be more than willing to assist you, too. Call our slip and fall attorneys at (704) 377-3770 and ask for a free consultation to learn more.