Articles Tagged with personal injury

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The first thing you feel after being in a car accident where no one got injured is relief that the accident was not worse than it was. Only then do the worries about finances start. How much will it cost to fix your car? Will you be able to get to your job while your car is being repaired, and if so, how much will you have to pay for alternative transportation, such as rideshare rides or a rental car? Do you have the money to pay your insurance deductible? How much will your car insurance premiums increase as a result of the accident? If you have to go to court, how much time and money will that cost? Your options for the most cost-effective way to pay for property damage vary according to the circumstances of the accident. Freeman Injury Law can help you choose the best course of action.

Florida Car Insurance Basics

Everyone who registers a vehicle in Florida must have two kinds of insurance. The first is Personal Injury Protection (PIP) insurance, which covers medical bills and injury-related lost income only; it does not pay for property damage. The other is property damage liability insurance, which pays for repairs to the other driver’s car if the accident is your fault. What do you do about repairing your own car, then? It depends.

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You probably have some kind of car insurance, since the law requires it. However, oftentimes you may not know what your car insurance actually pays until it’s too late. After a car accident, you call your insurance company, they might ask you follow-up questions by mail or phone, and then a month or more later, one of the people involved in the accident gets a check covering the some of their eleigible expenses. Just what are all those details that the insurance companies are working out before they decide how much to pay? Different types of car insurance pay for different things, and in some cases, they can even cancel each other out. If you are not sure if the amount that the insurance company offered you after your accident is correct, contact an attorneybefore you accept the settlement offer.

What is PIP Insurance?

All registered vehicle owners in Florida must carry PIP insurance, as well property damage liability insurance. PIP stands for Personal Injury Protection, which covers up to $10,000 of medical expenses and lost income when someone gets injured at an accident, regardless of who is at fault for the accident. In order to get PIP insurance to cover your accident-related expenses, you must seek medical treatment within 14 days of the accident. If a driver collides with a pedestrian or bicyclist who does not own a car (and therefore does not have PIP insurance), the driver’s PIP insurance might also pay the medical expenses and lost income of the pedestrian or bicyclist. If the drivers involved in the accident have additional optional car insurance, such as bodily injury or uninsured/underinsured motorist coverage, then the amount covered by PIP gets subtracted from what the other types of insurance must cover. This is called the PIP setoff.

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Aaron Papero, Esquire Freeman Injury Law

So, you slipped or tripped and fell and injured yourself while in the common area of your condominium. What duty does the Condominium owe to you as a tenant or invited guest otherwise known as an “invitee”?

Under Florida law, a landowner owes you two duties:

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If you are injured while on holiday in Florida from Canada, Europe, Australia or elsewhere, you may be searching for holiday compensation solicitors in South Florida.

VisitFlorida.org reveals Canada has the most international visitors to Florida, followed by the United Kingdom, Brazil, Argentina, Colombia and Germany. An estimated 12 million international visitors flock to Florida each year for our renowned beaches and boating, splashy theme parks and cruises and cosmopolitan cities and resorts. When any of these activities results in injury

Where Can I Find Holiday Compensation Solicitors in South Florida After Injury?

For the most part, the foundation of personal injury law in these nations is very similar (having derived largely from the Old English judicial model), it is important to point out a few key differences. There aren’t technically “solicitors” or “barristers” the way there are in your home country. There are simply lawyers, a term used interchangeably with attorneys.  Continue reading →

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South Florida trampoline park injuries among children have seen a stunning rise, with an NBC6 investigation reporting nearly 300 falls and injuries at trampoline parks resulting in 911 calls, about 70 of those requiring paramedics. Among those calls were a 4-year-old boy with a sprained ankle and a 6-year-old girl left bleeding after a larger child jumped on top of her and a boy who suffered a head injury. At one business alone, there were 60 calls to 911 in two years.

Larger studies suggest the problem is widespread and growing. For instance, a study published in the journal Pediatrics revealed that between 2010 and 2014, there were approximately 92,000 emergency department visits made during the study period. That alone is troubling, but particularly when you consider that trampoline park injuries spiked 10-fold during the study period. Five-to-six new trampoline parks open across the country every single month, with an estimated 450 open as of the end of last year. That’s compared to the 35 to 40 that were in existence in 2011 and 280 in 2014.

Sprains and fractures were among the most common trampoline injuries, with dislocated joints twice as commonly occurring at trampoline parks as at residential trampolines. Also more common at the businesses were fractures more likely to occur in younger children – accounting for roughly 50 percent of injuries among children younger than 6.  Continue reading →

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A business liability insurer will not need to provide coverage to a convenience store faced with claims of negligent supervision arising from a physical altercation between the store’s security guard and a customer.

According to records from the Wisconsin Supreme Court, the incident happened in 2009 at a convenience store when the customer visited the store to buy beer and that while he was inside the store, the security guard punched him in the face twice. Customer/ plaintiff left the store, called police to report an assault and was transported to the hospital where he received treatment for a broken jaw.

As our personal injury attorneys in Orlando can explain, actions for intentional tort can be difficult because many insurers will allege they do not cover intentional acts. However, there may be negligence claims that are applicable for which insurers are liable.

Plaintiff filed a personal injury lawsuit against the store owner, the security guard and the store’s insurer. He alleged the store had a duty to properly train and supervise employees, owing the highest degree of care for the safety of customers. The store’s liability insurer hired an attorney to represent him, but did so under “reservation of rights,” meaning that decision alone did not mean it would provide coverage for the end verdict. The insurer sought to bifurcate issues of coverage and liability and put the proceedings on the latter issue on hold until the issue of coverage could be decided, a motion the court granted. The store owner hired his own attorney to represent him on the issue of coverage. Continue reading →

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The doctrine of avoidable consequences, sometimes referred to as the “duty to mitigate,” is an affirmative defense that can be raised by defendants in personal injury cases to argue the plaintiff was partially or fully responsible due to failure to exercise reasonable care to reduce the injury or damages suffered. 

Sometimes, the doctrine of avoidable consequences is confused with the doctrine of comparative negligence. Both are issues raised by the defense, the main difference is while comparative negligence involves the allowance of a court finding that numerous parties contributed to the initial injury and therefore share liability damages, the avoidable consequences doctrine asserts plaintiff had a duty to prevent further injury after the the initial legal wrong occurred.

Plaintiffs must pay attention to this because it can substantially reduce damages (compensation you are owed) following a personal injury.  Continue reading →

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A Florida personal injury that occurs on someone else’s property can in some circumstances be compensated under the legal theory of premises liability. These theory opines that property owners owe varying degrees of duty to protect lawful visitors (and sometimes even lawful visitors) from unreasonable risk of harm. This could be a slip-and-fall, a dog bite, faulty stairs or negligent security resulting in vulnerability to a third-party criminal attack. One of the most common defenses in Florida premises liability lawsuits is the “open and obvious” doctrine. 

Essentially, as noted in the Florida Supreme Court’s 1952 decision in Early v. Morrison Cafeteria Co. of Orlando, a business property owner has a legal right to assume those invited to the site will perceive potentially dangerous conditions that are open and obvious to the ordinary senses. One has a duty to avoid these open and obvious dangers, and a business has no responsibility to warn patrons of these dangers. It’s the concealed dangers – those the business knows or should know about – that require warning. In any case, business property owners do have a responsibility to use “ordinary care” in keeping the site reasonably safe.

One premises liability case recently weighed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit considered whether a teetering tower of rolled insulation at a hardware store customer loading area was an open and obvious hazard, or whether the business owed a legal duty to address or warn of the potential danger.  Continue reading →

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When an employee causes injury to someone else in the course and scope of employment, their employer can be held vicariously liable for those injuries. The legal doctrine is called respondeat superior, which is Latin for, “Let the master answer.” 

Of course, an employer could also be found directly liable as well for things like negligent hiring, negligent retention, negligent supervision or negligent security. But respondeat superior does not require a finding that the business was negligent. As long as the negligent employee was acting in furtherance of the business at the time the incident occurred, the business may be liable.

This is what is alleged in a Florida personal injury lawsuit recently filed against Apple Inc. in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. The case is filed federally because, while the injury occurred in South Florida, the company is headquartered in California.  Continue reading →

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The Florida Supreme Court has ruled that “Stand Your Ground” immunity granted in criminal cases cannot be automatically transferred to civil cases filed in response to the same incident. 

The standard of proof in a criminal case – beyond a reasonable doubt – differs from that in a civil case – the preponderance of the evidence (which basically means it was more likely than not something occurred in a certain way). That’s why a person can be found not guilty in a criminal trial, but still be found liable for damages in a civil case.

Many civil injury lawsuits are predicated on wrongdoing based on negligence. That is, someone owed a duty of care, that duty of care was breached and injuries resulted. However, some civil cases involve intentional torts. These can include things like assault and battery, false imprisonment or intentional infliction of emotional distress. A single incident can be the subject of both a criminal case and a civil case, but the two are entirely separate, and the outcome of one should not influence the outcome of the other, though much of the same evidence may be presented.  Continue reading →

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