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Despite the rise of online shopping and food delivery apps, most New Yorkers find themselves in grocery stores fairly regularly. Just like crossing the road or climbing a staircase, walking down the aisles of these grocery stores comes with its own set of risks. In most cases, we accept that these risks are simply unavoidable. Injuries are a reality of everyday life. Accidents happen.
What if your injuries are a direct result of a grocery store’s negligence? What if they failed to promote safety in their stores? What if they knew about potential hazards and failed to address them? In this situation, you would be well within your rights to pursue a personal injury lawsuit against the grocery store that is responsible for your injury. In order to do this, you will need to hire an experienced, qualified attorney who understands the laws that surround “slips and falls” in New York.
Common Causes of Slips and Falls in New York Grocery Stores
The most obvious cause of a slip and fall in a New York grocery store is a spill. Because aisles are stocked full of all kinds of different foods, spills can result in slippery fluids and debris being scattered all across the floor. It is easy to step in one of these spills and lose your footing.
Wet floors may also cause a slip and fall. When cleaning floors, staff may neglect to properly dry the floors, leaving notable puddles of water behind. Usually, these wet floors are marked with caution signs. If staff members do not use proper signage, it can be virtually impossible to tell that floors are slippery, as a thin layer of water may be invisible.
Improperly stacked items may also cause you to fall, especially if they topple over onto you. Before you know it, you might be scrambling across the aisle as dozens of cereal boxes fall on top of you, causing you to trip and fall. There are many other possible scenarios in which negligence can contribute to a slip and fall.
Proving Negligence
Proving that grocery stores were negligent is challenging in New York. This is because these stores are only negligent if they knew about the potential hazard and did nothing to fix it. So how do you prove that a grocery store knew about a puddle or a spill without taking the necessary steps to clean it up?
If one shopper causes a spill that causes someone else to trip 30 seconds later, the grocery store can argue that they did not have enough time to prevent the accident from happening. Then again, it is unlikely that a judge will determine that you are 100% responsible for your own injuries.
Due to New York’s “pure comparative negligence” law, a likely scenario is that you will share some of the blame for your own injury, while the grocery store also assumes some of the responsibility. This means that you may be entitled to 50% of the compensation you would otherwise receive (or any other percentage that reflects your responsibility for the injury).
Get Legal Help Today
If you have suffered a slip and fall in a New York grocery store, reach out to Glassman Law Group today and get the legal help you need. Because of the statute of limitations, it is important to act quickly.