Articles Posted in Slip and Fall

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Earlier this month, the Georgia Court of Appeals issued a written opinion in a premises liability case that was brought by a college student who slipped and fell while walking from one class to another on a rainy day. Ultimately, the court concluded that the plaintiff presented enough evidence to survive the defendant’s summary judgment challenge, allowing her case to be submitted to a jury.

The Facts of the Case

The plaintiff was a student at Georgia Perimeter College. At the time she arrived at school, it was a nice day with clear weather. The plaintiff attended her first class, which was in a windowless classroom. After her first class ended, she went to her second class, which was in the same building and was also in a windowless classroom. Her second class ended at 11:15. During this time, the weather changed, and a rainstorm rolled in.

While the plaintiff was on the way to her third class, she slipped and fell in a puddle of water. The size of the puddle was contested, with the plaintiff claiming it consisted of “standing water,” and a professor who came to her aid estimating that there was less water present, about as much as if a wet paper towel had been wiped across the floor. The area where the plaintiff slipped was not near a door, and the water had been tracked in by fellow students.

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Earlier this month, a Georgia appellate court issued a written opinion in a premises liability lawsuit brought by a woman who slipped and fell after using the restroom in a fast-food restaurant. Ultimately, the court concluded that the plaintiff failed to establish that the fast-food restaurant had superior knowledge of the dangerous condition that allegedly caused the plaintiff’s fall. As a result, the plaintiff’s case was dismissed.

The Facts of the Case

The plaintiff dined at the defendant restaurant and then went to use the restroom. In a pre-trial deposition, the plaintiff explained that she entered the restroom and proceeded directly to the handicap stall. She did not see any water on the floor as she entered the stall. After about five or ten minutes, the plaintiff exited the stall, took about two steps, and then fell backwards. She had slipped after stepping in a puddle of water. The plaintiff sustained serious injuries as a result of her fall and filed a premises liability lawsuit against the restaurant.

In a pre-trial motion for summary judgment, the restaurant argued that the plaintiff’s case was insufficient as a matter of law because she failed to prove a required element of a Georgia premises liability lawsuit. Specifically, the restaurant argued that the plaintiff failed to show that the restaurant had superior knowledge of the hazard.

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Earlier this month, the Georgia Court of Appeals issued a written opinion in a premises liability lawsuit that was brought against the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA). The case, which was filed by a woman who had slipped and fallen on a train platform, was dismissed by the lower court. In the most recent appellate opinion, the court affirmed the dismissal of the plaintiff’s case, based on the finding that the accumulated rainwater should have been expected and that it did not constitute a dangerous condition.

The Facts of the Case

The plaintiff was planning to take a train operated by MARTA. According to the court’s opinion, it had been raining for most of the day. As the plaintiff approached the station, she entered a covered platform area. A few feet from the door of the platform, there was a small puddle of rainwater that had accumulated. No one knew how long the puddle had been present, but the plaintiff claimed that the area where the puddle had formed was darker, and she argued that this suggested there had been an accumulation of water there on-and-off for a number of months or years.

As the plaintiff stepped into the puddle, she slipped and fell. She then filed a premises liability lawsuit against MARTA, claiming that MARTA was negligent in maintaining the train platform and that it should be held liable for her injuries.

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Earlier this month, the Court of Appeals of Georgia issued a written opinion in a premises liability case brought by a man who had slipped and fallen at the defendant’s restaurant. Although the defendant did not initially reply to the plaintiff’s complaint, and a default judgment was entered against the defendant, that judgment was reversed on appeal because the plaintiff had never properly served the defendant.

The Facts of the Case

The plaintiff slipped and fell while at a restaurant owned by the defendant. After his fall, the plaintiff filed a personal injury lawsuit against the restaurant where he fell. As required by law, the plaintiff attempted to serve the defendant restaurant with notice of the pending case.

The restaurant, however, had a common name, and the owner of the restaurant owned similarly named restaurants. As a result of this confusion, the plaintiff ended up serving the correct owner of the restaurant, but he filed the complaint against one of the owner’s other restaurants. The owner responded that he would not be answering the complaint because it was filed against the wrong entity.

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The parents of a seventh grader filed a wrongful death lawsuit against a teacher after their child died under her care. The parents alleged that the teacher, who left her classroom unsupervised in violation of a school policy, caused the death of their child. In a recent opinion, a Georgia appeals court dismissed the lawsuit, finding the teacher was entitled to official immunity. The teacher was working at Benjamin E. Mays High School, a public school in Atlanta. The child was a seventh-grade student in the teacher’s classroom, which shared a bi-fold wall with another classroom.According to the allegations, one afternoon, the teacher left the classroom. While the teacher was gone, the child and another student engaged in horseplay. The child fell, and the other student landed on top of him. The teacher returned about 15 minutes later and then left again. The child then collapsed and became unconscious. The teacher returned about 15 minutes later and called 911. The child was pronounced dead at the hospital. The autopsy revealed that he died from blood loss, resulting from the dislocation of his collarbone.

Purportedly, the teacher originally was not truthful when asked about the incident, telling the principal she was in the classroom the entire time. Soon afterward, it was revealed that the teacher had left the classroom. It was unclear why the teacher left the classroom. In her deposition, the teacher said that she had asked the teacher in the adjoining room to listen for her class when she left the first time, but not when she left the second time. The school had a policy that stated that students were never to be left in the classroom unsupervised.

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Earlier this month, the Georgia Court of Appeals issued an opinion in a slip-and-fall case requiring the court to determine if the plaintiff’s evidence was sufficient to survive a summary judgment challenge filed by the defendant. In the case, Pipkin v. Azalealand Nursing Home, the court determined that the plaintiff established a genuine issue of fact regarding the condition of the floor where she fell, and it was not proper for the trial judge to resolve the issue through summary judgment.

The Facts of the Case

Mr. Pipkin was taken by ambulance to the defendant nursing home. His wife, the plaintiff, was following the emergency medical technicians as they took her husband into the facility. As Mrs. Pipkin rushed down the hallway after her husband, she slipped and fell outside the nursing home’s shower room.

Mrs. Pipkin recalled that she had stepped on something “slick” that made her fall. Her son also testified, and he explained that when he came to his mother’s aid, he noticed that the floor underneath her was wet and that she was lying in a puddle of clear liquid.

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In a recent case in front of the Georgia Court of Appeals, a woman sued a Georgia grocery store after she slipped and fell on a puddle of water in the store. The woman claimed that the store negligently maintained the premises.It was unclear how the water got on the floor. Around the time the woman slipped and fell, another customer told an employee about the water on the floor. The employee told another employee, who then went to get a bucket and a mop and a wet floor sign. The employee then went to clean up the spill. Around this time, the woman slipped on the water, although it was unclear whether she fell before or after the other customer notified the employee about the spill.

The court found there was insufficient evidence the grocery store was at fault. There was evidence that the store regularly inspected for spills and that the area where the spill occurred had been inspected about 20 minutes before the woman fell. In addition, there was no evidence the employees delayed going to clean up the spill. The court explained that since there was no evidence that the store should have known about the spill before the woman fell, and there was no evidence that the store failed to exercise reasonable care in cleaning up the spill when employees were notified, she could not show the store was at fault.

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In a recent case, the Georgia Court of Appeals held that a trial court made an error when it denied a plaintiff’s motion for spoliation sanctions based on the destruction of evidence relevant to the case at hand.  “Spoliation” is another way to say that a party to litigation has destroyed or materially altered relevant evidence.  This destruction can occur at the time of the wrongful event — the negligent act — or some time thereafter.   Continue reading

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Summer is here and with outdoor activities on the rise, the potential for slip and fall accidents is high. If you are searching for a slip and fall lawyer in Atlanta, it’s important to know that there is a strict timeline for filing a slip and fall lawsuit. The process for filing a lawsuit when you have a slip and fall accident in Atlanta gets tricky, and knowing what to file at the right time will ensure you case is brought into court.
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A new study by Johns Hopkins University has discovered that slips and falls are the top cause of traumatic spinal cord injuries in the United States, overtaking car crashes as the leading cause. The study determined that 41.5 percent of spinal cord injuries were caused by slips and falls over the three-year study duration.
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