Slipped and Fell on Long Island? What Most People Get Wrong About These Cases
Slipped and Fell on Long Island? What Most People Get Wrong About These Cases
It happens fast. One second you are walking into a store in Bay Shore or crossing a parking lot in Deer Park, and the next you are on the ground, embarrassed, hoping nobody saw. You get up, tell the manager you are fine, brush yourself off, and drive home. Then the next morning you can barely get out of bed.
Slip, trip, and fall cases are some of the most misunderstood injury claims I handle, and it is mostly because of what people believe about them before they ever call. So let me clear a few things up.
Why people talk themselves out of these cases
Almost everyone who falls blames themselves first. I should have been watching where I was going. I am just clumsy. It was my own fault. That instinct is so strong that a lot of genuinely hurt people never make the call at all.
Here is the thing. Whether you feel embarrassed has nothing to do with whether you have a case. The real question is not whether you tripped.
It is whether there was a hazard that should not have been there, and whether the property owner should have taken care of it.
It is about the hazard, not about being careful
Property owners in New York have a duty to keep their premises reasonably safe for the people they invite in, whether that is a store, a restaurant, an apartment building, or an office. When they let a dangerous condition exist, a wet floor with no sign, a broken step, a cracked and uneven sidewalk, poor lighting in a stairwell, or ice they had time to clear and did not, and someone gets hurt because of it, that can be their responsibility.
The key legal idea is notice. Generally, you have to be able to show that the owner either knew about the hazard or should have known about it and had a reasonable chance to fix it. A puddle that appeared thirty seconds before you walked through is different from a leak that had been spreading across the floor for hours while employees walked past it. Part of my job is figuring out which situation you were actually in.
Being partly at fault is not the end of your case
A lot of people assume that if they were looking at their phone, or wearing the wrong shoes, or moving quickly, they have no claim. Not true. New York uses what is called comparative fault. In plain terms, being partly responsible does not automatically disqualify you. It can reduce a recovery, but it does not erase it. You do not have to have been perfect to have been wronged.
The deadlines that quietly end these cases
This is the part I wish more people knew before they waited too long. In New York, you generally have three years from the date of a fall to bring an injury claim. That sounds like plenty of time, and it lulls people into putting it off until the evidence is gone.
But there is a much shorter and much stricter deadline hiding in some of these cases. If you fell on public or government property, a village sidewalk, a county building, a public housing complex, you may be required to file a formal notice of claim within just ninety days. Miss that ninety-day window and an otherwise strong case can be lost before it starts. Because it is not always obvious who owns the property where you fell, this is one more reason not to sit on it.
Winter on Long Island adds a wrinkle
We are heading into the season when a lot of these calls come in. Ice and snow falls are their own category, and New York can be particular about them. Owners are usually given a reasonable amount of time after a storm ends to clear things up, so the timing of your fall relative to the weather can genuinely matter. That is not a reason to assume you have no case if you fell on ice. It is a reason to get the details documented and looked at by someone who knows how the timing plays out.
What to do after a fall
If you can, take pictures right away of exactly what caused you to fall and the surrounding area, before anyone cleans it up or fixes it. Report it to the store, manager, or landlord and ask that an incident report be made, and get the names of anyone who saw it happen. Then get medical attention, even if you feel okay, because fall injuries to your back, knees, wrists, and head often show up a day or two later. And do not give a recorded statement to an insurance company before you have talked to a lawyer.
Then call me. Even if you are not sure it is worth it. You do not have to know whether you have a case before you pick up the phone. That is
what the free consultation is for, and it costs you nothing to find out.
The number is (631) 482-7808, available day or night. Finally, a Fella You Can Count On.
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