Have You Been a Victim of Negligence?
At Cantor & Burger we frequently represent those injured by the negligence of another. This is a civil lawsuit also known as a tort. Torts arise out of negligence and so you may ask, “What is negligence”?
Negligence is the failure to exercise the care that a reasonably prudent person would have exercised in the same or similar situation. Negligence generally means that a person was careless or did something they should not have done. An example would be violating stop sign while driving.
Negligence is sometimes defined in simple terms as an accident. A common example of negligence would be a rear end collision where the front of one car strikes the rear of another car. In this simple example as the Plaintiff, the people suing, we would argue that the defendant was negligent in allowing the front of the vehicle to run into the back of the Plaintiff’s vehicle and thereby caused injury.
The term negligence is used in every personal injury case. The definition of negligence changes depending on the facts. There is a different definition for negligence for auto accidents, where the definition of reasonable care is the highest degree of care, as opposed to medical malpractice cases where the definition is defined as conduct that violates the standard of care for that particular medical practice area. There is yet another definition of negligence for products liability, for slip and falls and the like.
The Missouri Approved Jury Instructions guide us in the definition of negligence. Overall the approved instructions have ten separate distinct definitions for the concept of negligence. In the above driving example, the defendant has a duty to use the highest degree of care. The phrase highest degree of care as used in these instructions mean that degree of care that a very careful person would use under the same of similar circumstances. (MAI 11.01) There are, however, different definitions for negligence. Consider a child’s actions, MAI 11.04 is entitled definition negligence of a minor and states, “the term negligence or negligence’s as used in these instructions with respect to a 10 year old Plaintiff, means the failure to use that same degree of care of which an ordinary careful boy of the same age, capacity and experience would use under the same similar circumstances.
My law school professor at Loyola University in New Orleans would say in his southern draw that to prove a tort you had to prove negligence. Negligence has four elements including duty, breach, cause and damages.
The first element, duty, is what obligation you have to another person. In the simple example that I have used of driving a car, you owe the other drivers on the road, passengers and those around you the highest degree of care. If other words, you have to drive like a very careful person would under the same of similar circumstances. That is your duty.
To be successful in a claim you have to prove that the Defendant breached that duty of care. In other words, they didn’t act carefully and use reasonable care. In the example I sited above the Defendant breached the duty of care owed by running the front of his vehicle into the back of your vehicle by either going to fast or not paying attention or whatever the case may be. That is the breach of the duty of care.
The third element is cause. My professor always left that out there alone. Did one thing cause another? It is pretty simple as the front of a car hits the back of another car, but there is no ding, there is no scratch and you don’t even feel it because it hits it as light as a feather you don’t have a case. Why is that? Because it has to cause….damages.
Damages. The damages in your personal injury case are your pain and suffering. The harm that you have sustained. It is your medical bills, it is your loss wages and it is your future medical. It is your ongoing complaints. It is all those things that you can touch and feel about a personal injury claim. In the example that I have given your damages are to repair a bumper if you are uninjured. The idea of negligence runs through all the cases that we handle on a contingency fee at Cantor & Burger. In order to be successful in our cases we must prove that there was a duty of care that owed, that duty was breached, the breach of that duty caused damages.
If you have a tort that arises out of negligence, or someone caused harm to you, call us for free at 314-542-9999.
