What To Do After a Slip and Fall Accident in Miami

Just imagine a beautiful day in Miami, you’re walking down Coral Gables as you really appreciate the architecture.

The Irish embassy, the European influence buildings, and the calm setting is just amazing. 

Suddenly, you slip and fall. You didn’t even expect it to happen. All of a sudden you’re on the floor and you are more embarrassed than anything. You don’t even want to get up and continue. You fell so hard, everyone definitely saw you fall.

You can’t stay on the floor forever so you try and get up, but you realize something doesn’t feel right. Your wrist isn’t moving and it hurts to move it. You finally manage to get up and your ribs hurt, not to mention, it hurts to breathe. 

With all this pain, what’s the next move? Was it your fault that you slipped and fell? Were you just being negligent and ignoring signs or was it someone else’s fault?

How A Slip and Fall Accident Works

To have a legitimate slip and fall case, there has to be something that caused the slip which would have resulted in your fall. 

A dangerous condition such as uneven flooring, wet floor, cracks in the sidewalk or flooring, and other conditions has to have caused your fall. 

The most important factor in a personal injury case like a slip and fall though, is negligence. You must be able to prove negligence in a slip and fall case.

What is negligence? 

Negligence is basically failing to uphold safety precautions and doing your part to keep the community safe. For example, if a business knows that there is a wet spot on the floor in their building but they DON’T put up a sign and someone slips as a result of not knowing about the wet spot, then that could be considered a sign of negligence.

In the end, there just has to be proof that there was a dangerous condition that was formed by the entity that owns the property. This entity has to have known of the dangerous condition and not done anything to create a safer environment. 

But let’s say the entity in charge of the property did put up a sign and you still got in a slip and fall accident, then it is very likely that you will be at fault. Why? You did not do your part to uphold your duty to keep the community safe. The sign was there to keep everyone safe, and by not abiding by it, you have basically endangered your own life by not watching the warnings. 

Negligence in a Slip and Fall Accident

In the previous paragraph, we showed how negligence works. 

But we know that negligence can still be a little confusing. As confusing it is, negligence is actually a simple concept. 

Here are more examples of negligence, so that there is a better understanding of it. 

• Commercial Property
  • Commercial properties like restaurants, bars, clubs, or just any kind of property that the main use is for business, the owner has to put a warning for any possible hazardous condition.
  • For slip and fall accidents on commercial properties, there must have been at least one of the three conditions listed:
    • The owner of the property must have caused the dangerous condition.
    • The owner of the property knew about the dangerous condition, but did nothing about it.
    • The owner of the property should have known that there was a dangerous condition because they are a “reasonable” person, and any “reasonable” person would have known of the dangerous condition.  
• Residential Property
  • In residential properties, landlords are held liable for not taking care of their land. Things that fall under “not taking care of your land” are: 
    • The landlord had the ability and control to take care of the dangerous condition
    • The dangerous condition would have not have been unreasonable or outrageous to fix
    • If the dangerous condition was not fixed or solved, then it would have resulted in a serious injury
  • Since the landlord failed to take the proper steps to take care of the dangerous condition, the serious injury happened to the person. 
• Government Property
  • Government property is a little more difficult to determine. Since these properties are protected and backed by the government, there is lots of leeway and more protection for the owners. 

Contacting a Personal Injury Lawyer for a Slip and Fall Accident in Coral Gables

If you or a loved one got in a slip and fall accident in Coral Gables, or anywhere in Miami, contact a personal injury lawyer. 

Our team of personal injury lawyers are well-equipped with decades of experiences and millions won for our clients. 

From the simplest slip and fall cases to the most complex cases, our team has done it all. There is no case that our team has dealt with. Commercial property, residential property, or even government property. Our team has really had a case in all of those properties and know how to build you a strong case no matter how severe your injuries are. 

We start with a free consultation to see how we can help you, and then from there we start gathering evidence and photos to build you a strong slip and fall case.