Premises Liability

Premises liability refers to the legal responsibility of property owners and renters when someone experiences an injury or loss on their property that was caused by unsafe or dangerous conditions or activities coming from the property. The most common type of premises liability case is a “trip and fall” but the firm has recovered money damages from owners who have failed to provide adequate security or poor conditions resulting in criminal attacks, sexual assaults, and even falling down the public staircase drunk because fresh varnish pooled and caused the tenant to slip and break his elbow.

The level of legal responsibility property owners have to protect anyone on the property from harm depends on how the individual has entered the property.  For example, those who are there to further the purposes of the property owner (like customers of a business) are given the most protection.  Elderly tenants who fall and break their hip or shoulders or arms because of an elevator accident have the maintenance company and the building owner to look to for medical bills and pain and suffering.  Individuals that have entered the property without permission are considered trespassers, or that are there as delivery persons with a license to access the premises, have some rights but are given less protection.

Under the law, property owners are expected to take reasonable, prudent measures to make sure other people will be safe on their property from intended and sometimes unintended or undisclosed dangers.  The law on premises liability is particularly complex because detailed investigation must be conducted into the history and source of, for example, the inadequate building security, wet floors, unmarked obstacles, animal bites, elevator accidents, hazardous chemical fumes, or an employee or a third party’s criminal conduct.

The firm has litigated many premises liability cases successfully, and repeatedly established liability against individual owners and tenants, and their companies for serious personal injuries related to a property owner’s poor management, operation, and maintenance of their property and business.

In one really complicated case, the firm proved that a famous amusement park operator and an adult alcohol bar allowed an 18-year-male to get wildly intoxicated at a bar before he and his friends were confronted by dangerous gang members.  Mr. Kar was able to obtain video evidence, that the bar and property owners at first denied existed and then “lost” and could no longer find.  The video evidence confirmed that security guards acted negligently and left Mr. Kar’s client vulnerable to the serious attack in the parking lot after security left.

Mr. Kar’s client was double stabbed in his kidneys and beaten unconscious with a 9mm Berretta hand-gun, and almost shot in the head at point blank range by a gang member suspected of a prior murder. Mr. Kar successfully forced the reluctant property owner to settle after obtaining Alcohol Beverage Commission records that proved the property owner had a legal obligation to hire and post L.A. Sheriff’s deputies in the area where the attack occurred.

When you’ve been injured on someone else’s property, the Law Office of Joseph M. Kar, PC knows how to get the evidence to get you legal compensation that you are entitled for your injuries and losses. The firm has repeatedly taken down big companies and won, even in cases that seemed impossible—we offer the same aggressive representation for you.