When you spend the day at the St. Louis Zoo or shopping for groceries at a supermarket downtown on your way home from Busch Stadium, you expect that those businesses to keep you and other patrons safe.
You may not even think about things like getting hurt or having an accident because you trust that businesses do what's necessary to keep visitors safe. In fact, it's an expectation under Missouri law that property owners and businesses make a reasonable effort to maintain a safe environment for visitors and patrons.
When property owners and businesses fail to uphold this expectation, and a visitor gets injured, this brings up premises liability. If you get hurt as a visitor to a property, you may have grounds for a premises liability claim. This type of law can prove confusing and overwhelming.
Attorneys at the Bruning Law Firm in St. Louis can help you navigate your situation and claim. Our lawyers have decades of experience and dedication to protecting clients' rights to compensation. All cases involve unique facts, and we understand that. We've successfully recovered millions of dollars for our clients, always pursuing maximum compensation on behalf of our clients.
To better understand St. Louis premises liability law, potential injuries, and other aspects of the claims process, we provide a breakdown and overview below. Remember that all cases involve specific facts that will dictate their specific course of action. Make sure to contact our St. Louis premises liability lawyers at the Bruning Law Firm for a free consultation to discuss the details of your case and your eligibility to pursue compensation.
What Is Premises Liability?
Premises liability involves a person filing a lawsuit to hold a property owner or other entity responsible for damages that stem from an injury that the person filing the lawsuit sustains on the property. Basically, premises liability cases involve someone who got hurt on someone else's property because of that individual's negligence or failure to maintain a safe environment.
Not everyone who gets hurt on someone else's property may seek damages, so if you've sustained an injury and think the property owner may bear liability, you should contact an experienced St. Louis premises liability lawyer to discuss your situation.
Premises Liability Visitor Status
The law divides visitors to any property into three different categories. When determining a visitor's status, you must consider why the person has entered the property, whether they received an invite (whether explicit or implied), and what kind of interaction that person has with the property owner or entity.
Licensee
A licensee receives a direct or implied invitation to enter a property without any kind of mutually beneficial business relationship. For example, if you receive an invitation to a friend's house for dinner to celebrate a birthday, you qualify as a licensee, since you have no commercial interest in this dinner party situation.
Invitee
An invitee to a property also enters with the owner's permission, but the invitee receives an economic benefit. For example, if you visit an apple orchard in St. Louis to purchase fruit that you or the farm picked, you qualify as an invitee because of the economic relationship you have with the property. A person visiting grounds open to the public also constitutes an invitee.
Trespasser
A trespasser knowingly enters a property without permission. Basically, trespassers know that they haven't received an invitation to the property but enter it anyway. Trespassers violate the legal duty to respect another person's right to property.
Premises Liability Statistics
Premises liability accidents, particularly slip and fall injuries, represent a significant public health and legal issue across the United States. Understanding the scope of these incidents underscores why property owners have a legal obligation to maintain safe conditions for visitors.
According to the National Floor Safety Institute (NFSI), approximately 8 million emergency room visits each year are related to falls, making them the leading cause of ER visits nationwide. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that falls result in over 800,000 hospitalizations annually, with hip fractures and traumatic brain injuries among the most serious outcomes. Among adults aged 65 and older, falls caused 38,742 deaths in 2021 according to CDC National Center for Health Statistics data, highlighting the potentially fatal consequences of unsafe property conditions.
From a legal perspective, research from Jury Verdict Research shows that the median premises liability verdict nationally is $98,160, though verdicts can reach well into the millions depending on the severity of injuries and degree of negligence involved. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and NIOSH data indicate that slip, trip, and fall accidents account for 26% of all nonfatal workplace injuries resulting in days away from work, making them one of the most common causes of lost productivity and workers’ compensation claims.
These statistics demonstrate that premises liability injuries are far from rare. If you have been injured due to a hazardous condition on someone else’s property in St. Louis, the experienced premises liability attorneys at the Bruning Law Firm can evaluate your case and help you pursue the compensation you deserve.
Common Premises Liability Scenarios in St. Louis
Premises liability accidents in St. Louis can occur in a wide variety of settings, from retail stores and restaurants to apartment complexes and public sidewalks. Understanding the most common scenarios can help you recognize when a property owner may be liable for your injuries.
- Wet or slippery floors — Spills, recently mopped surfaces, or leaking fixtures in grocery stores, malls, and restaurants without proper warning signs
- Uneven sidewalks and parking lots — Cracked pavement, potholes, or raised concrete sections that create tripping hazards
- Inadequate lighting — Poorly lit stairwells, parking garages, hallways, and building entrances that obscure hazards
- Snow and ice accumulation — Failure to salt, sand, or clear walkways and parking areas during St. Louis winters
- Loose or broken handrails — Defective railings on staircases and ramps that fail to provide adequate support
- Negligent security — Insufficient lighting, broken locks, or lack of security personnel that leads to assaults or robberies on the property
- Swimming pool accidents — Missing fences, broken gates, lack of depth markers, or absence of lifeguards at public or residential pools
- Elevator and escalator injuries — Malfunctioning equipment, sudden stops, or doors that close on passengers due to poor maintenance
If you were injured in any of these scenarios or a similar situation on someone else’s property in the St. Louis area, contact the Bruning Law Firm to discuss whether you may have grounds for a premises liability claim.
Types of Injuries
Attorneys at the Bruning Law Firm have the tools and know-how to help initiate many types of injury claims that involve premises liability.
Some common injuries that may result in premises liability claims include:
- Animal and dog bites
- Slip and fall accidents
- Dangerous property
- Negligent or inadequate security
- Swimming pool injury
- Inadequate maintenance
- Children on property
- Retail store liability
- Restaurant liability
Slip and Fall Accidents
When a person slips or trips on someone else's property and sustains an injury, this constitutes a slip and fall injury. As with any injury, knowing if you have legal grounds for a claim can prove confusing. To determine whether you qualify to pursue compensation for your injuries, contact a St. Louis premises liability lawyer at the Bruning Law Firm for advice.
Even though this type of injury often involves elderly individuals, everyone faces a risk for slips and falls. These accidents can happen inside businesses or outside on the property, as well due to a variety of unsafe property conditions and hazards.
If you see a brightly colored yellow or orange sign indicating a wet floor, this reflects a business that's taking reasonable steps to prevent harm to patrons. However, if you slip and fall on a wet floor or spill that has no sign or warning in a department store or grocery store, this may qualify you to pursue a slip and fall claim.
In addition, uneven pavement, flooring changes, or slipping outside due to a walkway slick from rain or ice reflect other types of situations that may result in a slip or trip and injury.
Animal and Dog Bites
According to Missouri law, a dog owner faces strict liability if the dog bites another person who isn't trespassing and did not provoke the dog. For example, if you find yourself relaxing at Compton Hill Reservoir Park, and a dog runs up and bites you, you may qualify to pursue compensation to cover the cost of your injuries. By the same token, if you visit the St. Louis Zoo, you expect the zoo and staff members to take precautions to ensure that none of the animals cause you harm.
Even with strict liability for dog bites and the fact that Missouri law does not consider the dog's previous temperament, winning these types of claims can still prove challenging to navigate without having an experienced lawyer, like those at the Bruning Law Firm, on your side.
Swimming Pool Injury
Since a private swimming pool in the backyard of someone's home may entice a child (who also may not understand rules that prohibit trespassing), Missouri law requires that all pools have a fence or barrier surrounding them. The fence must also reach at least four feet high to prevent children (and all other trespassers) from using the pool.
Attractive Nuisances
Continuing with Missouri law's special treatment of children, property owners must also take reasonable safety precautions to protect children from attractive nuisances. Swimming pools, tree houses, trampolines, swing sets, and outdoor playsets all constitute attractive nuisances. Even though a child may enter a property uninvited, the home or property owner still owes the child a duty of care and may bear liability for damages that stem from the child's injury.
Restaurant Liability
When you visit a restaurant to enjoy a meal, the restaurant also needs to take reasonable precautions to keep you and other patrons safe. Restaurants involve moving around a lot of food and beverage products, so restaurants owe patrons a duty to keep floors clean from spilled beverages or dropped food, which visitors might slip on. In addition, decor and lighting in restaurants might cause patrons injury should that decoration or lighting fixture fall as a result of improper installation or faulty equipment.
Negligence and Inadequate Maintenance
Property owners must regularly check their properties and the surrounding area for maintenance issues or potential areas where visitors may get hurt. One common cause of premises liability accidents includes improper lighting in and around the property and parking lot. Broken or missing lights may cause different injuries.
For example, inadequately lit exit ways or stairways can result in a patron not seeing a handrail or step and falling on the stairs or landing. In a parking lot, a lack of lighting can obscure wet or slippery areas, causing an outside slip and fall. Finally, failing to indicate and provide proper lighting for exit ways can have harmful or deadly consequences in the event of an emergency evacuation during which visitors cannot find their way to the exit.
Financial Burden of St. Louis Premises Liability Injuries
Whenever a person or child gets hurt, that injury has a financial impact. The extent of the cost and financial burden depends on the specific situation, injury, treatment, and outcomes.
Injured individuals and their families may bear responsibility for costs like:
- Medical bills: Health insurance may not cover your entire medical costs should you suffer an injury. What's more, not everyone has insurance or can pay for costly co-payments even if insured. The medical treatment doesn't always end with your initial hospital stay after an injury. You may require additional doctors' visits and follow-up surgeries or procedures depending on your injury.
- Rehabilitation costs: Some injuries may need weeks or months of rehabilitation, either at home with a nurse or therapist or in an outpatient or residential rehabilitation center. The cost of rehabilitation residence further burdens already stressed individuals and their families.
- Lost wages: Time spent in the hospital and rehabilitating at home or in a facility means time away from work. If you cannot return to work for weeks or months, you may miss out on wages needed to financially support you and your family. Even more frustrating, your injury may permanently disable you, and you may never return to your same job or career.
- Pain and suffering: The mental and emotional aspects of injuries create anguish and difficulty for injured individuals and their families. Struggling to engage in regular activities or to spend time working and exercising takes a toll. In addition, injured individuals who previously felt healthy may feel understandably frustrated when they must now rely on medical or family caregivers to care for themselves or complete certain tasks.
- Specialized medical equipment: Following an injury like a slip and fall, you may need medical equipment to make your house accessible. This means you may need tools and equipment to help you move around the house safely and complete basic care tasks, like eating and bathing. Furthermore, you may need to have other machines, monitors, or medical beds to help with your temporary rehabilitation or long-term care and lifestyle changes.
- Specialized transportation costs: If you cannot drive due to your injury, you still need transportation to and from therapy sessions and doctors' visits. Your vehicle may not accommodate you due to your injury, so you may need medical transportation that can carry your wheelchair or that has needed space for comfort.
- Wrongful death: If your loved one died as a result of a business or property owner's negligence in maintaining a safe premise, your family likely faces a huge financial burden. The loss of a family member is hard enough, but then you also must deal with medical bills, burial costs, and the pain of your loved one's absence. Wrongful death constitutes a large and saddening financial burden associated with premises liability claims.
Missouri Premises Liability Law
Understanding how Missouri law governs premises liability claims is essential for anyone who has been injured on another person’s property. Missouri applies specific legal standards that determine whether a property owner can be held liable for injuries sustained on their premises. These standards address the duty of care owed to visitors, how fault is allocated, and the time limits for filing a claim.
Duty of Care by Visitor Status
Under Missouri law, the level of care a property owner must exercise depends on the legal status of the person who enters the property. There are three categories of visitors, each carrying a different standard of care:
- Invitees receive the highest duty of care. Property owners must regularly inspect the premises for dangerous conditions, make timely repairs, and provide adequate warnings of any known hazards. Invitees include customers in stores, patrons at restaurants, and anyone entering a property that is open to the public for business purposes.
- Licensees are owed a duty to warn of known dangers that are not obvious. Property owners do not need to actively inspect the premises for licensees, but they cannot conceal known hazards. Social guests, such as friends visiting your home, are typically classified as licensees.
- Trespassers are generally owed the least duty of care. Property owners must simply refrain from willful or wanton conduct that could injure a trespasser. However, Missouri’s attractive nuisance doctrine creates an important exception for children, requiring property owners to take reasonable precautions to protect minors from dangerous conditions like swimming pools and trampolines.
Comparative Fault in Missouri
Missouri follows a pure comparative negligence standard. This means that even if you were partially at fault for your accident, you can still recover compensation. Your damages will be reduced by your percentage of fault. For example, if you are found 30% at fault and your total damages are $100,000, you would recover $70,000. Under Missouri’s pure comparative fault system, you can recover damages even if you are found to be 99% at fault, as established in Gustafson v. Benda. This is more favorable to injured plaintiffs than the modified comparative negligence systems used in many other states.
Missouri’s statute of limitations for premises liability claims is five years from the date of the injury, as set forth in RSMo 516.120. While five years may seem like a generous window, evidence can deteriorate and witnesses’ memories can fade over time. It is always best to consult with a St. Louis premises liability attorney as soon as possible after your injury to protect your legal rights.
Window to Make a St. Louis Premises Liability Claim
Different statutes of limitations apply when it comes to the window of time that you have to file a claim. Under Missouri law, someone has five years to make a premises liability claim for damages from injuries. As legal investigations and filings take time, don't wait to begin the process. The St. Louis premises liability lawyers at the Bruning Law Firm can review your situation to determine if you qualify to file a claim. Even if your situation doesn't necessarily reflect the above-mentioned scenarios, you still may qualify to pursue compensation.
The Premises Liability Claims Process
Filing a premises liability claim involves several important steps. Taking the right actions from the start can significantly strengthen your case and improve your chances of recovering full compensation for your injuries. Here is a step-by-step overview of the typical claims process in Missouri:
- Report the incident to the property owner or manager. Notify the owner, manager, or employee on duty about the accident as soon as possible. Ask them to create a written incident report and request a copy for your records. This official documentation creates a contemporaneous record of the event.
- Seek medical attention immediately. Even if your injuries seem minor, get a professional medical evaluation. Some injuries, such as concussions or soft tissue damage, may not present obvious symptoms right away. Medical records create a direct link between the accident and your injuries, which is critical for your claim.
- Document the hazardous condition. Take photographs and videos of the dangerous condition that caused your injury before it is repaired or cleaned up. Capture the overall scene, any lack of warning signs, lighting conditions, and the specific hazard. Also collect contact information from any witnesses who saw the accident occur.
- Preserve physical evidence. Keep the shoes and clothing you were wearing at the time of the accident. Do not wash or repair them. The defense may try to argue that your footwear contributed to the fall, so preserving these items can help counter such claims.
- Consult a premises liability attorney. Contact an experienced St. Louis premises liability lawyer to evaluate your case. An attorney can advise you on the strength of your claim, handle communications with insurance companies, and protect you from making statements that could hurt your case.
- Investigation and demand. Your attorney will conduct a thorough investigation, gather evidence, review medical records, and calculate the full extent of your damages. They will then submit a demand to the property owner’s insurance company and negotiate for a fair settlement. If the insurance company refuses to offer adequate compensation, your attorney can file a lawsuit on your behalf.
Remember that Missouri’s statute of limitations gives you five years from the date of your injury to file a premises liability lawsuit under RSMo 516.120. However, if you were injured on government-owned property, you may be required to provide written notice of your claim within 90 days of the incident. Failing to meet this deadline could prevent you from pursuing your claim entirely, so it is important to act quickly and seek legal counsel right away.
Premises Liability FAQ
Who Is Responsible for My Slip and Fall Injuries?
Liability for slip and fall injuries depends on who had control over the property and the hazardous condition at the time of the accident. In many cases, the property owner bears responsibility. However, liability may extend to property managers, tenants, maintenance companies, or other parties who had a duty to maintain safe conditions. For example, if you slip on an icy sidewalk outside a leased retail space, the tenant, the landlord, or even a contracted snow removal company could potentially bear liability depending on the terms of their agreements. An experienced premises liability attorney can investigate the facts of your case and identify all responsible parties.
What Do I Need to Prove in a Premises Liability Case?
To succeed in a premises liability claim in Missouri, you generally must prove four elements: (1) the property owner or occupier owed you a duty of care based on your visitor status; (2) the property owner breached that duty by failing to maintain safe conditions, failing to repair a known hazard, or failing to provide adequate warning; (3) the breach of duty was the direct cause of your injury; and (4) you suffered actual damages such as medical expenses, lost wages, or pain and suffering as a result. Your attorney will work to establish each of these elements through evidence, testimony, and expert analysis.
How Long Do I Have to File a Premises Liability Claim in Missouri?
Missouri’s statute of limitations for premises liability claims is five years from the date of the injury, as established by RSMo 516.120. However, this deadline can be shorter in certain circumstances. If you were injured on government property, you may need to provide written notice within 90 days. Additionally, waiting too long can compromise your case because evidence may be lost, surveillance footage may be overwritten, and witnesses’ memories may fade. It is always best to consult with an attorney as soon as possible after an accident.
Can I Recover Compensation if I Was Partially at Fault?
Yes. Missouri follows a pure comparative negligence system, which means you can still recover compensation even if you were partially responsible for your accident. Your total damages award will be reduced by your percentage of fault. For example, if a jury determines your total damages are $200,000 but finds you were 25% at fault for not paying attention to a warning sign, you would receive $150,000. Unlike many other states that bar recovery once fault exceeds 50% or 51%, Missouri allows injured parties to recover damages even at 99% fault, as held in Gustafson v. Benda.
What Compensation Can I Recover?
In a successful premises liability claim, you may be entitled to recover compensation for a wide range of damages, including: medical expenses (emergency room visits, surgeries, physical therapy, prescription medications, and future medical care); lost wages (income lost during recovery and diminished future earning capacity if your injuries affect your ability to work); pain and suffering (physical pain, emotional distress, anxiety, and reduced quality of life); and other losses such as property damage, out-of-pocket expenses, and loss of consortium. In cases involving particularly egregious or reckless conduct, punitive damages may also be available.
What if I Was Injured on Government Property?
Claims against government entities in Missouri are subject to special rules. Under Missouri’s sovereign immunity laws, you may be required to file a written notice of your claim within 90 days of the incident with the appropriate government body. This notice must include details about the accident, the nature of your injuries, and the damages you are seeking. Failure to provide timely notice can result in your claim being barred entirely, regardless of its merits. Additionally, there may be caps on the amount of damages you can recover from a government entity. Because of these additional requirements and tight deadlines, it is critical to contact a premises liability attorney immediately if you are injured on government-owned property in St. Louis.
The Bruning Law Firm Can Help With Your St. Louis Premises Liability Claim
If you or a family sustained injuries on someone's property or while at a store or business, the property owner may bear liability for your injury costs and other financial burdens. If a loved one dies because of unsafe property conditions or injuries sustained on someone else's property, you may have a case for wrongful death. Every case is different, of course.
The Bruning Law Firm's experienced St. Louis premises liability lawyers can help sort through your situation and advise on the next steps should you have grounds for a claim. Don't wait to hear from the other party's lawyers first. Contact us at the Bruning Law Firm by calling (314) 735-8100 for assistance. You can also use our website chat feature 24 hours a day, or submit an electronic request for a free consultation. We serve injured clients in Illinois's Metro East and the Missouri suburbs as well as St. Louis.
Client Testimonial
"When other law firms failed me. Bruning Law Firm came through for me. They did a great job and were able to get me more compensation than I expected. Couldn't be more pleased. Truly glad these folks were there for me. Took care of everything. Truly pleased. Tthank you Ryan and Alice." - Joseph F.
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February 2020
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