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Who can I hold responsible for my slip and fall accident?

When slip and fall accidents occur on someone else's property, it's possible to hold the owner financially responsible for paying any medical bills for injuries that you may occur. Whether you're able to do so depends largely on the circumstances surrounding the incident.

Two common assessments that are made in situations like this. The first involves deciding whether the property owner took necessary precautions to address any potentially hazardous conditions. The second involves determining whether the person who fell was acting carelessly at the time of the fall.

Generally, in order to hold a property owner liable for an injury such as this, the person who fell must be able to show that the landlord both created and knew about the presence of a dangerous condition. That condition must have been something that the injured individual did not know about and, as a result, they could not take proper precautions to avoid it.

To prove liability in a case of this type, the person who fell must be able to demonstrate that the property owner caused the hazardous situation and that, despite knowing about it, they failed to correct it. They also must be able to that they were aware of the problem for long enough that they had time to correct that issue before the fall occurred.

Hazardous situations that might fall under this umbrella include falls that occur in poorly lit areas, on wet floors, torn carpet, narrow stairwells, cracked sidewalks, into potholes and in icy entryways.

In slip and fall cases, there may be no one definitive way to prove that a property owner was liable for an individual's injuries. In many cases, it boils down to whether the property owner did everything possible to make the property as safe as possible. Also important is whether the owner should have expected that not fixing a situation could have resulted in another's injury.

If you've had a slip and fall accident on someone else's property, then you should consult with a New Mexico premises liability attorney right away. In doing so, he or she can advise you of certain reporting requirements and compensation caps that may exist in your respective legal matter.

Source: FindLaw, "Slip and fall accidents overview," accessed Oct. 12, 2017

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