You can slip and fall anywhere as you go about your daily routine, but these accidents are almost all preventable. When another party’s negligence leads to your slip and fall accident and injuries, you shouldn’t have to absorb both the economic consequences and the physical pain. Fortunately, Virginia law provides an avenue for injured individuals to hold property owners liable for their negligence and seek compensation.
If you have suffered injuries from a slip and fall accident that occurred on another party’s property in Virginia, you should seek compensation through a slip and fall claim. Contact the skilled Virginia slip and fall injury attorneys at Emroch & Kilduff at (804) 358-1568 to discuss the details of your fall and determine the best path forward given your specific circumstances.
- Emroch & Kilduff’s Results in Slip and Fall Injury Cases
- Where Slip and Falls Often Happen
- Scenarios That Lead to Slip and Fall Accidents
- What Rights Do Visitors Have on Another Party’s Property?
- Common Losses from Slip and Falls
- When to Call a Virginia Slip and Fall Attorney
- Contact a Skilled Virginia Slip & Fall Injury Attorney Today— Contact Emroch & Kilduff’s Attorneys Now
Emroch & Kilduff’s Results in Slip and Fall Injury Cases
The award-winning legal team at Emroch & Kilduff has been advocating for accident victims for 50 years, including those who suffered injuries in slip and fall accidents. The firm’s slip and fall attorneys have ample experience in the negotiation, settlement, and litigation of slip and fall claims. Our attorneys’ commitment to seeking justice and dedication to client service has resulted in the recovery of hundreds of millions of dollars in damages for our clients.
In a recent case, our client slipped and fell on black ice while walking from the apartment building where he lived to his vehicle. He suffered multiple leg fractures and complications as a result of his diabetes. The case settled for $7.75 million during mediation.
This is only an example of one case and does not guarantee a particular outcome for your slip and fall injury case. Regardless, Emroch & Kilduff has the resources to investigate your slip and fall accident, gather relevant evidence, and build the best case possible against the negligent property owner.
Where Slip and Falls Often Happen
The last thing you expect to happen when you are out at a store browsing the aisles or trying to find your seat at a show is to sustain injuries in a slip and fall. If you suffered injuries in a slip and fall while outside of your home, you might deserve compensation for your losses. Connect with your Virginia slip and fall attorney from Emroch and Kilduff today to discuss your injuries and legal rights.
Slip and falls can happen in almost any type of business or property, and some common locations in Virginia include:
- Shopping centers
- Movie or live theaters
- Parking lots
- Grocery stores, including Wegman’s, Kroger, and others
- Sporting events and arenas
- Hotels and resorts
- Busch Gardens and other theme parks
- College campuses, including UVA, VCU, and Virginia State
- Condo or apartment building common areas
No matter where your slip and fall happens, you risk suffering serious injuries.
Common injuries from slip and falls include:
- Neck and back injuries
- Bone fractures/breaks
- Traumatic brain injury
- Soft tissue damage
When you have injuries from a slip and fall, the costs and losses can be extensive. If you suffered injuries in a slip and fall due to someone else’s negligence, you deserve full compensation for your damages.
Scenarios That Lead to Slip and Fall Accidents
The Virginia Department of Health estimates that more than 1,000 people end up in the hospital each year in Virginia from unintentional falls. A more alarming number is the approximately 1,500 people who have died from unintentional falls each year in Virginia over the last decade. A portion of those hospitalizations and deaths occur because of slip and fall injuries.
Slip and fall accidents involve specific types of unintentional falls where a person loses their balance on a floor, stairway, or another surface. Most attorneys also include trip and fall accidents under the umbrella of slip and fall accidents.
Some common scenarios that may lead to a slip and fall or trip and fall accident include:
- Slippery floor from rain and wet product use or spillages from cleaning products, wax, food, and water
- Uncleared snow or ice on sidewalks, storefronts, apartment buildings, and parking lots
- Inadequately maintained walkways and sideways
- Falling debris from a construction site or dilapidated building
- Inadequate indoor and outdoor property maintenance that leads to dangerous hazards, such as broken tiles, loose carpet, loose stairs, and broken handrails
What Rights Do Visitors Have on Another Party’s Property?
Virginia law, like in most other states, maintains that property owners have duties to visitors. The exact duties and liability for injuries from a slip and fall accident vary based on the type of visitor. Virginia recognizes three types of visitors: (1) invitees, (2) licensees, and (3) trespassers.
Invitees
Property owners welcome invitees onto their property to conduct business. Examples of invitees include diners in restaurants, shoppers at grocery stores, and clients at hair salons. Invitees also include individuals visiting public properties, like parks and libraries. Property owners owe the greatest duty to invitees, and a breach of that duty opens property owners up to liability for accidents.
Under Virginia law, property owners must exercise ordinary care toward invitees, maintain the premises in a reasonably safe condition, and remove hazardous objects in a reasonable amount of time. Property owners must also warn visitors of any known unsafe conditions or those they should know about.
Virginia law does provide one exception regarding recreational property use. Landowners have no duty of care to maintain safe premises when they permit others to use their land for hunting, fishing, camping, water sports, boating, hiking, and other types of outdoor recreation.
Licensees
Property owners may or may not invite a licensee on their properties. Invited licensees are simply social guests, such as friends and family. The biggest difference between a licensee and an invitee is the lack of a business transaction.
Uninvited licensees typically have implied permission to visit another party’s property. Property owners need not warn uninvited licensees of known dangers, but they must employ reasonable care to eliminate known dangers on their properties regardless. Examples of uninvited licensees include delivery drivers, repair professionals, and utility workers.
Trespassers
Individuals who do not have implied or express permission to visit another party's property are considered trespassers. If they slip and fall and suffer injuries, a Virginia court may not hold the property owner liable for damages. Property owners, however, cannot intentionally harm a trespasser or set traps that lead to injury.
Common Losses from Slip and Falls
When you suffer injuries in a slip and fall accident, you may experience a variety of losses from your injury. First, your out-of-pocket expenses are the first losses that you will experience due to your slip and fall injury. These can include the cost of your emergency room medical care, as well as any related medications and follow-ups. You should receive full coverage of your medical costs, which include your costs for care needed in the future and not only those that immediately followed the slip and fall injury.
After a slip and fall injury, changes to your personal and professional life are also compensable losses. If you cannot return to work for weeks after your injury, you should receive the replacement of your losses related to wages or salary benefits you missed while recovering from your injuries. In terms of your personal life, if you cannot continue engaging in the same activities after your injury as before, then you can seek compensation for the loss of your enjoyment of your life in the same way.
The damages that you can recover for your injury intend to put you in as close a position as possible as though the injury had not happened. While your medical treatments might address the injury, some of the symptoms might never go away, and your life may never be the same. When you cannot engage in the same personal activities or experience different levels of pain and suffering when engaging in even normal activities, you should receive damages for the losses to your quality of life.
Measuring the value of your injury and the amount of compensation you should receive is your slip and fall attorney's job. Too many people grossly underestimate the value of their claims, which can lead them to accept an insurance offer that is far less than they need and deserve.
It might be tempting to accept a quick $100,000 offer from an insurer to get a check in your hand without needing to call a lawyer. However, with a lawyer’s help, you might realize that you have closer to $300,000 in past and future losses, and they will continue negotiating for the full amount that covers your losses. Of course, the value of your specific claim will depend on your losses, and the best way to feel confident in your settlement is to have our Virginia slip and fall lawyers evaluate your case.
When to Call a Virginia Slip and Fall Attorney
Reach out to an attorney after your injury as soon as possible after you receive emergency medical care. If you have injuries, you must seek out emergency medical care, as you want a prompt and complete diagnosis to prove that your injuries stemmed from the slip and fall accident. You also want to start treatment immediately to help improve your prognosis and mitigate complications.
After your emergency medical care, additional follow-ups might be necessary to determine and manage the long-term effects of your injuries and identify how they might impact your ability to work. Professional medical opinions are critical to your case, as they analyze your injury and determine what your injury will mean in the long term, including the cost of any related treatments, medications, or rehabilitation.
When you have injuries, your compensation should include not only the cost of your immediate medical bills after the injury from the emergency room, but also the cost of any future medical bills you might encounter due to the injury. This determination can require analysis by medical experts familiar with your type of injury.
Outside of collecting compensation for your medical costs, your slip and fall attorney will also ensure that you collect damages to fully cover any other financial losses you experienced due to your injury. In the short term, you deserve compensation for any wages that you lost while out of work due to your injury, including any work-related benefits missed like accrued sick time or vacation time. In the long-term, you deserve compensation for any lost future potential that resulted from your injury.
If you cannot return to work or can only return to a position that pays less than before your injury, you should receive damages to make up for the difference in your earning ability from the time of your injury through your working life.
For example, if you made $50,000 a year before your injury, and after your injury, you can only work a part-time job that pays $20,000 a year, you should seek damages for this loss of income for the rest of your working years, adjusted for inflation. This is difficult to compute, but your experienced Virginia slip and fall attorney handles many similar cases, and such calculations are an everyday matter for us.
Reach out to our Virginia slip and fall attorneys from Emroch and Kilduff to schedule a consultation as soon as possible to determine the possible value of your damages and the best path forward in your case.
Contact a Skilled Virginia Slip & Fall Injury Attorney Today— Contact Emroch & Kilduff’s Attorneys Now
Sustaining severe injuries in a slip and fall accident not only causes physical pain, but also victims typically amass medical debt, lose income from missing work, and may even face future medical expenses and lost wages if they suffered catastrophic injuries.
If you suffer from injuries due to the fault of another person or company, contact Emroch & Kilduff or call us at (804) 358-1568 for a free consultation. Our experienced premises liability accident attorneys can anticipate insurance company and defense legal team tactics, and our attorney can protect your rights and build the best case against the property owner whose oversight led to your accident.
Our team of experienced injury attorneys can help you understand your options.
Do not hesitate to contact us at our offices in Richmond or Tappahannock for a consultation with an experienced accident injury attorney.
Client Testimonial
“Emroch & Kilduff was a great company to help me in my time of need. The staff was very kind and professional. They kept me very informative on everything and were very pleasing and easy to work with. Everyone was very friendly and knew all their information. Definitely would recommend and go back to them for help again. Thank you Emroch & Kilduff for all your time and help.”
Rating: 5/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Danielle R.
Read more reviews on Google!