What The Baltimore Injury Plaintiff Must Prove

In general, a negligent action is recklessness that results in personal injury to someone else. It might be an activity, like recklesslessly knocking a rock off a rooftop, or a failure to behave, like a landlord who doesn’t repair a damaged step. A negligent action typically creates the justification for personal injury lawsuits.

To win a legal case for negligence, the plaintiff (the individual filing the personal injury lawsuit) will need to prove four things: That the accused (the man or woman or entity being sued) owed the plaintiff a duty of due care; that the negligent party failed to use due care towards the injury victim (i.e. breached the duty); that the defendant’s breach of duty caused the plaintiff’s an injury; and that the injured party suffered damages as a final result.

Duty of reasonable care: The plaintiff needs to show that the negligent party had a duty of reasonable care toward the injured party. An individual has a duty to avoid causing harm to another if a reasonable man or woman in the same scenario could foresee that an behavior (or failure to take action) might lead to an injury. Some scenarios are very clear. We all know that somebody may be hurt if we run a stop light, so we have a duty of care to follow traffic regulations and signals. Other circumstances are more complicated. If a homeowner has a private swimming pool in a fenced yard, does he have a duty to prevent a neighbor child from climbing the fence and accidentally drowning in the pool? How much care would a reasonable individual take in that circumstance? In each situation, the conditions concerning the injury play an essential role in deciding whether or not a defendant had a duty of due care towards the injury victim.

Breach of Duty: The injured party needs to prove that the negligent parties failed to carry out their duty of care. For example, an ordinary man or woman could foresee that a truck full of explosives may blow up, so somebody who parks such a vehicle in a crowded parking lot has breached the duty of care to the other individuals nearby. If the vehicle blows up, the driver could be guilty of negligence. Somebody might possibly also foresee that a car that isn’t fixed adequately might malfunction, so if the brakes on a poorly maintained car fail and the car hits a kid, the owner of the car may have breached the duty of reasonable care to that child. Each and every car owner has a duty to maintain the car in a safe and sound condition. On the other hand, if the owner routinely maintains and repairs the car and the brakes failed because the brakes were faulty or the mechanic made a mistake, the owner did not breach a duty of due care, though the brake manufacturer or the mechanic could be to blame.

Result in: The plaintiff has to show that the negligent persons breach of duty brought about the harm for which the injured party is suing. Often causation is straightforward. If you run a red light and hit a pedestrian, you clearly caused the harm. If the pedestrian’s elderly mother has a heart attack and passes away when she hears of her daughter’s injury, did you cause that injury? Most likely not, but those are the kinds of concerns that have to be resolved in a negligent conduct personal injury lawsuit. There can also be questions about what injuries was caused by an accident. People generally have more than one accident in their lives, so if somebody has had two prior back injuries, what injury to the back was caused by the most recent fall down a flight of stairs?

Damages: Damages in a negligence legal action try to put the plaintiff in the same situation he or she would be in if the accident hadn’t occurred. A injury victim will need to show the financial value of his or her injuries. For example, if an individual is disabled and can no longer work, a calculation of damages would consider the job of the plaintiff and the amount he or she would have earned during the time left in a normal working career. Damages would also include medical costs and estimated costs for medical treatment, special accommodations, and assisted living.

In some circumstances negligent parties are liable for negligent conduct because of the operation of law, and not because they immediately caused a personal injury. For example, since an employer is held responsible for injuries brought on by employees during work, UPS may be liable if a UPS driver has an accident while making deliveries. A hospital might be held accountable for injury caused by only one nurse. Injury victims typically make claims against several negligent parties to make sure there will be enough assets (money) to pay a judgment.

If you’ve been the victim of a serious car accident in Maryland, you need the advice of an experienced Maryland personal injury lawyer. Talk to a local Maryland personal injury lawyer about your options.