Instructive Differences Between Premises Liability and MVA Cases
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By: Michael Neff
The Law Office of Michael L. Neff, P.C.
“Premises liability cases are really different than car wreck cases.” I say this phrase a lot to lawyers in Georgia and around the country. Most adults I’ve met have driver’s licenses. Thus, most people are familiar with the need to follow the rules of the road to keep people safe. Jurors often have a heuristic that they can use to assess liability in a car wreck cases. Further, because of this shared experience, many lawyers don’t have a steep learning curve when learning to handle car wrecks.
The same is not true in a premises liability case. The average person doesn’t have experience owning, managing, or operating commercial real estate. Thus, they don’t know about safety rules that exist to keep workers and invitees safe. As a result, jurors don’t have a schema for assessing liability. They have to be taught the right way to manage property to eliminate or mitigate the risk of serious injuries.