How Can Negligence Per Se Help Your Case?

Many people don’t understand that someone can be negligent, without breaking an actual, written law. Just as an example, there is no written law that says that a store has to clean their floors every hour, or that a property owner has to warn someone that there is a loose tile in the kitchen that they could fall over.

Negligence is not necessarily breaking a written law—it’s the failure to exercise due care, or to use the ordinary and proper care that a reasonable person would exercise.

When a Law is Broken

But sometimes, people who are negligent, are also breaking a law. Take, for example, a property owner who has stairs, and those stairs don’t have handrails. Most every county has building ordinances that require handrails.

Or, imagine a law that requires that open wires be covered, or protected. A property owner doesn’t do that, leaves active wires open, and someone else is electrocuted.

Another example would be a public pool with no lifeguard, if a city ordinance were to require a lifeguard.

Negligence Per Se

In these cases, the property owner was, of course, negligent—but there is also a written law that was violated.

When there is an actual written law that was violated that causes injury to someone else, the victim can sue for what is known as negligence per se. Think of negligence per se as “automatic negligence,” because the mere proof that there was a law that existed, and that the law was not followed or it was ignored by the Defendant, by itself proves the negligence.

This is a “fast track” to proof by the victim, because ordinarily a victim has to show that the Defendant owed the victim a duty, and breached that duty by doing something wrong. The victim must show what the Defendant did wrong, and how others in a similar position acting prudently, would have done things differently than the defendant did.

But none of this has to be shown in a negligence per se case. All you have to show is that a law was broken, that the law was intended to protect the class or kind of person who was injured, and that the victim was injured because of the Defendant’s failure to follow or abide by the written law.

A Lot of Laws

Because the victim gets a quicker and easier path to showing that the Defendant was negligent, it is always in the victim’s best interest to try to find an actual written law or statute which was violated. The good news is that this is more common and easier than you may think.

Any type of city ordinance, or county or city codes, including building codes or Florida’s administrative code, will suffice for a law that allows the victim to sue for negligence per se.

Did someone break a law that caused you injury? Schedule a consultation with our Tampa personal injury lawyers at Barbas, Nunez, Sanders, Butler & Hovsepian today for help after your accident.

Sources:

biotech.law.lsu.edu/books/lbb/x133.htm

scholarcommons.sc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3893&context=sclr