Slip and Fall Lawyer Serving Lakewood
A slip-and-fall in Lakewood, on a wet supermarket floor, an icy parking lot, a broken sidewalk, or a poorly maintained apartment property, can leave you with a serious injury and a property owner insisting it was not their fault.
New Jersey premises-liability law under N.J.S.A. 2A:15-5.1 requires businesses and landlords to keep their property reasonably safe and to warn about hazards they knew about or should have found. With Lakewood's dense mix of retail on Route 9, large apartment complexes, and heavy foot traffic, these cases are common, and heavily defended, because the owner's insurer will argue the danger was open and obvious or that they had no notice. Proving notice, meaning that the hazard existed long enough that the owner should have fixed it, is usually the heart of the case, which is why fast evidence-gathering matters. We work on contingency, so there is no fee unless we win.
What We Know About Lakewood Cases
Lakewood slip-and-fall claims most often come from wet or unmarked floors in Route 9 retail stores, icy or broken parking lots and sidewalks, and hazards in the township's many apartment complexes.
The owner's duty depends on the property: commercial businesses owe a higher duty to customers, and after a snow or ice storm the duty kicks in once a reasonable time has passed to clear it, because New Jersey's ongoing-storm rule does not give owners a free pass forever.
These cases usually turn on notice, meaning whether the owner knew or should have known about the hazard, so photographs, incident reports, and witness information gathered early are often decisive.