In order to establish who is at fault, or liable, for an accident, you will have to prove that someone was negligent. What exactly is negligence? As this can apply to car accidents, slip and falls, as well as medical malpractice, negligence can mean a lot of different things, but it will always come down to whether or not someone was reckless, and whether or not this recklessness caused an accident. Read on to get a better idea of what negligence is, and how this can be established.

In many cases, the plaintiff (the personal filing the claim) would have to prove that there was a "duty of care", and that this was violated. This would be vital in a premises liability claim, for example. A premises liability claim could stem from a slip and fall accident, or from some injury that occurred on another person's property because they did not keep the premises reasonably safe. If you are a customer at a grocery store or a guest at neighbor's home, the store owner and your neighbor each have a duty of care to keep their property reasonably free from safety hazards. It should be noted though that not every injury on someone else's property constitutes a breached duty of care. If you are a trespasser, then owners do not have a duty of care toward you. This could even look like a man wandering past a clearly labeled "Employees Only" door at the grocery store; even if he gets severely injured by heavy boxes falling on top of him, the store will not be liable for his accident. The store has no duty of care to customers who are in prohibited areas.

Context is key when it comes to determining negligence, as an action in one situation would constitute negligence, while in others it would not. We could take a baseball game, on a baseball field, for an illustration. Let us say that a spectator in the stands gets hit on the head by a foul ball. That spectator could not claim negligence on the player's part, as this is part of the game. If anything, the spectator was irresponsible in their choice of seat. But let's say that the batter is enraged at the umpire, and ends up throwing the bat into the bleachers, in which case any resulting injury would be due to negligence. The spectator was allowed to be there, and was not assuming the risk of a thrown bat; that is not part of the game. That batter would be at fault for the injury caused by the negligent act of throwing the bat. Now if this baseball game is taking place in a parking lot, and a hit ball ends up smacking a passerby on the sidewalk, then whoever hit the ball could be held liable for the injuries caused by that stray hit.

So in a personal injury claim, you would have to prove that someone else was negligent, AND that you were being responsible. If you were also negligent, then you could lose some of your compensation, or even all of it in a few states. You are not technically proving negligence, however, as all a plaintiff has to present is a reasonable argument that someone else was negligent. These general principles can apply if there was a workplace accident, such as when an employer breached a duty of care by failing to provide a reasonably safe work environment. If you are hurt by a defective product, then the manufacturer or seller might be at fault for your injuries too. To learn more about how negligence applies to any kind of personal injury case, contact an experienced personal injury attorney today!