Shopping Center Slip & Fall Accident Lawyers Collingswood, NJ
Skilled NJ Personal Injury Lawyers Fight for Clients Injured in Slip and Fall Accidents in Shopping Centers in Camden County, Gloucester County, and Across New Jersey
Shopping center owners owe a duty to their patrons to ensure that the shopping center premises are safe enough for visitors to visit. However, many shopping center owners fail to take sufficient precaution to catch and remedy dangerous conditions on the shopping center premises. As a result, people across New Jersey end up suffering a slip and fall accident while visiting shopping centers. If you or a loved one have been injured in a slip and fall accident at a shopping center, you know that even a seemingly minor accident can result in severe, expensive injuries.
The award-winning personal injury attorneys of Andres, Berger & Tran will use their experience and teams of experts to determine who exactly is at fault for your slip and fall along with the compensation you need to treat your injuries and make you whole. Our attorneys represent shopping center slip and fall victims throughout Marlton, Camden, Cherry Hill, and Haddonfield.
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Identifying the Responsible Party for a Shopping Center Slip and Fall Accident
In many shopping center slip and fall accident cases, it can be difficult to determine who is legally responsible for the slip and fall victim’s financial damages. Factors that go into determining responsible parties include things like what location in the shopping center the slip and fall occurred, who owns the property where the slip and fall occurred, whether that property is leased and what the lease terms are, or whether maintenance is contracted out to a third-party. Parties who may potentially be responsible for damages from a shopping center slip and fall accident include:
- Business owner: If you fall inside a particular store at a shopping center, the owner or operator of that store likely has responsibility for discovering and eliminating hazardous conditions in the store that could cause a slip and fall.
- Property owner: Many shopping centers are owned by someone or some entity other than the operators of the businesses inside the center. If your slip and fall occurs outside a particular store, especially in what may be known as the “common areas” of the shopping center, the center’s owner may be responsible.
- Management company: Whether a particular business owner or the center’s owner is responsible for keeping the property free of hazards that could cause a slip and fall, they may contract that responsibility out to a management or maintenance company, whose negligence may be directly and proximately responsible for your slip and fall.
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In some cases, two or all three of the above parties may share responsibility for a shopping center slip and fall. The experienced slip and fall attorneys of Andres, Berger & Tran will investigate your case to determine who was responsible for removing the hazard that caused your slip and fall and who is, therefore, responsible to compensate you for your injuries.
How Can the Shopping Center Slip & Fall Accident Lawyers of Andres, Berger & Tran Help You Pursue Your Claim?
Property owners owe a legal duty to keep their property reasonably safe for visitors. However, the extent of this duty depends on the visitor’s status on the property, which itself depends on whether the visitor is authorized to be on the property and their purpose on the property. Under common law, visitors to the property are divided into three categories:
- Invitee: An invitee is someone who has the authorization to be on a property, and enters the property for the benefit of the property owner or occupier. Common examples of an invitee are customers of a restaurant or retail store. Property owners owe the highest duty to invitees to keep the property free of any dangerous conditions the owner knows of or should know of, and to warn invitees of any non-obvious dangerous conditions.
- Licensee: A licensee is someone who has the authorization to be on the property but visits the property for the licensee’s own benefit. Common examples of licensees would be social guests or party guests. Property owners owe a duty to warn licensees of any dangerous conditions on the property but have no duty to inspect the property for hidden or non-obvious hazards.
- Trespasser: A trespasser is someone who has no authorization to be on the property; as a consequence, a property owner owes trespassers the lowest duty of care, which is to refrain from intentionally or recklessly causing harm to a trespasser.
The shopping center slip and fall attorneys of Andres, Berger & Tran know that, although most visitors to shopping centers qualify as invitees, not every visitor to a shopping center may fit neatly into one of these three categories. That’s why our experienced attorneys will evaluate the circumstances of your case to advocate for the highest possible legal duty if your status is uncertain.
Schedule a Free Consultation with an Experienced Mount Laurel, NJ Shopping Center Slip & Fall Accident Lawyer
If you or a loved one have suffered a shopping center slip & fall accident, contact the experienced personal injury attorneys of Andres, Berger & Tran today for a consultation on your case. We’ll let you know what your legal options are, who may be responsible for your accident, what kinds of compensation you may expect if you bring a claim, and how we can help you pursue that claim.
Frequently Asked Questions About Shopping Center Slip & Fall Accidents
There are many factors that go into determining who is financially responsible for your accident. We’ll investigate where your accident occurred, and also examine the contracts between the shop owners, the shopping center owners, and any management or maintenance companies to determine who was responsible for protecting you from the hazard that caused your slip and fall and whether they breached that duty.
The sooner, the better. There may be surveillance video available of the slip and fall site and/or witnesses to your fall. We will contact the business to assure that they do not destroy the video and get a copy to be used for your case. We can also get witnesses to provide written statements as to what they saw.
In New Jersey, negligent personal injury claims are subject to comparative fault. That means even if you are found to be partially responsible for your own slip and fall, the parties who are responsible for maintaining the area where your slip and fall occurred can still be required to provide you some compensation if they breached a duty to you to clear up or warn you of the hazard that caused your slip and fall.
