The Liability Issues in a Slip and Fall Case in Maryland

The owner of a property can be held liable to pay for your injury. In Maryland the owner's liability depends on what kind of property he has (business or residential) and why you were there in the first place (business reasons, social reasons or trespasser). For example, if the property is a business or the property is some one's home. In each case the owner has a different duty to you the visitor. If you are invited there or you are a trespasser the owner has a different duty to you. Most times premises liability is difficult to prove. Not impossible but difficult. I personally have had very good success with the premises liability claims. My largest recovery was against a hotel in Ocean City where my client slipped on ice. It was late on New Years eve the hotel had left the outdoor hot tub open and available. My client a wonderful women in her early 50's had gone with friends to the hotel. After dinner they looked outside and saw the hit tub was still open. They changed cloths and as my client exited onto the patio approaching the tub, down she went. Our theory of liability focused on the hotel's knowledge that water turned to ice in the cold. Hard to dispute that truth. And oh yeah people in hot tubs get wet. And when wet people walk from the hot tub to the door to enter the hotel they drip water. The long and short of it, don't leave the hot tub open in the freezing cold. If you do then at least warn people that is might be slippery between the patio door and the hot tub. That seems to make sense since the hotel owners have been there for many winters and knew or should have known of the danger they created and this was my client's first time ever to this hotel. You see the basis of this type of liability involving a business and a business invitee is the knowledge the owner has of the danger and the opportunity they had to correct it or warn. One of the first questions to ask a client on a slip and fall is where did you fall and secondly what made you fall. Where tells you the duty owed by the owner to your client. What made you fall is critical to success. As a lawyer you must establish the owner knew of the danger. This knowledge can be established if you can prove the danger was there for a long time or the owner created the danger. I had a slip and fall at a gas station which I won. The client slipped on oil. The owner argued the oil could have been left by the car immediately before my client arrived. In which case how could they know there was a danger in time to fix or warn. I was able to prove by eyes witnesses that the oil spill had tire marks thru it and foot prints in it. The foot prints lead directly to the glass windowed pay booth. Had the attendant been looking he would have seen the oily foot prints and could have taken corrective action to make the area safe or warned my client of the danger. It is important to note the owner of a property is not an insurer of the safety of the visitors. Giant Food v Mitchell 640 A 2d 1134. As a plaintiff you need to prove the business owner had knowledge and an opportunity to clean or warn and you the plaintiff had no reason to know or expect there was a danger there. Three ways to prove knowledge to the owner: 1. owner created the danger (Ocean City Hotel above); 2. an admission by the owner or an employee that they knew (extremely rare); and 3. constructive knowledge of the danger (the oily gas station above). Do appreciate the owner must have had an opportunity to clean or warn. So proving how long the danger existed is critical.
If you or your family member has been injured in a slip and fall, please feel free to call me. I am happy to discuss the case with you over the phone at no cost to you.