When an accidental injury occurs to a visitor on another person's property, the owner of the property may be liable for those injuries. If you have been injured through a slip and fall accident which you believe may be the result of the negligence or recklessness of another person, you may be able to recover money to reimburse you for all of your medical bills, lost earnings, disfigurement, pain, emotional distress and any permanent physical disabilities that you have suffered.

In cases involving slip and fall accidents, injured persons generally must prove that the property owners either failed to maintain the property, created an unsafe condition, which caused the injury, or knew about the dangerous premises or unsafe hazard but failed to alert visitors of the defect. Slip and fall accidents are personal injuries, but are only one type of "fall down" accidents. There are four general types of this sort:

• Trip-and-fall accidents, where there is a foreign object in the walking path
• Stump-and-fall accidents, where there is an impediment in the walking surface
• Step-and-fall accidents, where there is an unexpected failure or hole in the walking surface
• Slip-and-fall accident, in which the interface of the shoe and the floor fails

Both the property owner as well as the injured person can be held to varying degrees of responsibility for a slip and fall injury. While each person has a duty to watch where they are going business and property owners are responsible for needless injuries caused by hazards, which are easy to correct.

Ideally, a slip and fall accident report should be completed at the time of the incident noting what happened, who witnessed both the accident and the conditions that caused the fall along with any other relevant information such as lighting. The requirement for a slip and fall accident report though is generally a store or business policy and is not mandated by law.

If a slip and fall case report is not completed at the business location or the accident occurred at a private location or was not observed by others, compile a record of what happened to yourself. Include information such as:

• A description of the circumstances
• Who was present at the place of the accident
• The comments made by those who saw or helped after the fall
• If possible, take photos of the area. If you were physically hurt, have your slip and fall injury checked out immediately to help substantiate your slip and fall claim.

If you have been injured in a slip and fall accident, which you believe is due to the property owner's negligence, we would like to hear from you. Call us at 480.503.9217 for a FREE consultation.

The law office of Wilson-Goodman & Fong, P.C., provides a wide range of legal services to meet the varied needs of individuals and families in Phoenix, Arizona. We serve clients in Maricopa County and Pinal County, and the communities of the East Valley, including Gilbert, Chandler, Chandler Heights, Mesa, Tempe, Queen Creek, Apache Junction, Casa Grande, Florence, Gold Canyon, Eloy, Maricopa, and Coolidge.