Legal Reforms and Tougher Juries Make Winning Slip & Fall Cases Difficult

Shannon Weidemann

Contributor

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In the last six years, the number of people winning a slip and fall injury case has decreased. Juries are putting much more personal responsibility on the plaintiff, especially after some very high profile cases with large awards. The biggest one to date is the woman who spilled coffee on her lap and was awarded $2.9 million.

Lawyers are becoming pickier about what cases they take on; choosing the few cases they think will have a better chance of winning. Reforms made in 1999 mean that plaintiffs must prove there was a dangerous condition that a company knew about and did not remedy it, causing injury. Many cases are being settled out of court.