The defendant owned or controlled a given premise. The victim had been invited onto that same property. The same victim was injured, due to the dangerous condition on the owner’s/controller’s premise.
What is the definition of a premise?
The term premises could be used in reference to all types of structures, and to any open space.
What are the essential elements of a premises liability claim?
The premise on which the claimant was injured had an owner or a controller.The owner or controller had been careless and neglectful. Frequently, that neglect has been demonstrated by an omission. For instance, the controller or owner might have failed to maintain a premise, thus allowing it to develop some dangerous features.
Injury Lawyer in Richmond Hill knows that if there was negligence due to which the plaintiff had suffered measurable harm, while on a dangerous structure, or while within an unsafe space, a claim can be filed. By the same token a plaintiff’s injury might have resulted from a decision to pass by a dangerous structure of an unsafe space.
If the same structure or space had displayed a warning sign, then the victim would not have a sound basis for a premises liability claim. The danger would remain, but a smart person would be expected to obey the warning sign.
That possible chain of events relates to the last of the 4 essential elements for a premises liability claim. That element consists of evidence that the chances for harm to the plaintiff should have been foreseeable. That final element makes it impossible for someone to walk out to a cordoned-off construction site, in order to get injured and sue the owner of the same site, or the contractor.
Someone injured on government property faces an additional obstacle, upon trying to file a lawsuit. The government requires any potential claimant to send a notice of intent to sue within 10 days of the injury-causing accident. In addition, governments make a point of fixing a dangerous location as quickly as possible. Lawyers and paralegals appreciate that fact and hesitate to file a lawsuit against any government agency.
How such hesitancy might play out?
Suppose that some paralegal was driving over a parking lot, one that had no warning sign. Then suppose that his car suddenly hit a construction ditch. Should he sue or not?
This happened at about 4 pm in the afternoon. The workers saw what happened. There was a good chance that the government body would order changes before traffic had returned in the morning.
The list of facts should explain why the same paralegal chose to do nothing. He knew that by the time he had managed to write and send the required notice, those driving on the parking lot would be directed away from the dangerous ditch.