Slip & Fall Laws in Illinois

To begin, slip and fall relates to a type of personal injury case. Slip and fall cases take place when a person slips and falls on another’s property. These types of accidents most usually occur on someone’s property, due to their negligence in some way. Whether you trip on someone’s torn carpet, get hurt due to visibility issues, or slip and fall on an unmarked wet spot, you may be entitled to compensation. No matter the case, if you were injured in any way resulting from a slip and fall accident, you may have a valid case. 

Liability of the Property Owner

Firstly, property owners are required to make sure that their property is up to date and overall safe. Therefore, if a person is injured on another’s property and can prove they were hurt because of the owner’s negligence, they will likely win their case. Certain aspects like, how long the dangers been present and how the injured person acted before getting injured are things to consider.

Proving Fault in Slip & Fall Cases

Proving fault in slip and fall cases is considered harder than other types of cases. Determining if someone is responsible for your injury would depend on if the person failed to uphold a duty, they were responsible for. The plaintiff involved must be able to prove that their injury was not due to their own negligence. For example, say someone just mopped. They forget to mark the wet spot with a hazard sign, you slip, fall, and get injured. In this type of example, you will likely have a valid case. In addition, you must prove your injury was caused by a dangerous condition. On top of that, you must also prove that the owner of the property knew about or created the dangerous condition. Lastly, to prove that the property owner knew about the hazardous conditions, plaintiff’s must be able to prove the following.

  • The owner created the hazardous condition.
  • The owner was aware of the dangerous condition and failed to correct it.
  • The dangerous condition has existed a long time, the owner failed to repair of fix the situation. 

Slip & Falls on Commercial Property

This section directly correlates to slip and falls associated at business’ like a store or restaurant for example. Slip and falls associated with commercial buildings usually have many people involved, unlike normal slip and fall cases. Again, it should be mentioned that proving slip and falls cases can be difficult. Therefore, in order to prove your slip and fall case, the following are required.

  • The property owner must have caused the dangerous condition.
  • The property owner was aware of the dangerous and did nothing to about it.
  • Another person in a similar position would have identified and corrected the dangerous condition, the guilty party was neglectful.

Slip & Falls on Residential Property

Tenants of apartments and other rental properties should be aware that landlords could be liable if you are injured on their property. If your landlord showed neglect towards the property and you are injured, you may have a case. Similarly, to both regular and commercial slip and fall cases, you will be required to prove a few things.

  • The landlord involved had the opportunity to fix the problem and did not.
  • The repairs were reasonably priced and should have been made.
  • The landlords’ neglectful actions directly are responsible for their tenants injury.