The person that has been designated as the party at-fault for a given accident is the person that has breached his or her duty of care.
All individuals have 2 duties
A duty to act in a reasonable manner
A duty to avoid injuring others
For those in certain positions, the listing of their duties includes more than the 2 that represent the obligations of every person
For those men and women that are operation some means of public transportation, even a minor breach of duty can lead to charges of liability. Professionals must meet the standards established by authorities within the same profession
—Doctors have an added obligation
—Lawyers have an added obligation
A business must strive to keep its customers safe.
An act that qualifies as a breach of duty allows anyone harmed by the same action to claim the commission of an act of negligence.
A negligent action could entail doing something illegal, and, thus, putting others in danger. By the same token, it could entail the failure to carry out an expected action. In order for an injured victim to prove that someone else’s negligence caused his/her injury, the same victim must show that the act performed by the allegedly negligent individual was the proximate cause of the victim’s injury.
Victims cannot prove someone else’s negligence simply by showing that the same person has breached his or her duty.
It is the victim’s responsibility to show that the other party’s negligent act actually caused the reported injury.
It is also the victim’s responsibility to produce evidence of the fact that the injury-causing action had forced the victim to deal with a loss of marked value.
—That could be a loss of property, or damage to property
—It could also be the loss of an opportunity.
What defenses do defendants have, if any of them have been charged with having behaved in a negligent manner?
A defendant could deny the existence of proximity between the defendant’s actions and the victim’s reported instance of harm, as per personal injury lawyer in Monterey Park.
A defendant might argue that the victim’s injury did not qualify as a marked level of damage. That is often the defense in the case of harm done by a defective product.
A defendant’s defense attorney might point out the fact that the victim had failed to mitigate the effects of any injury. He or she had failed to seek a doctor’s care during the 24-hour period that followed the accident.
Those defendants that had been operating a recreational or sporting facility at the time of the accident could claim that the victim had been willing to assume a known risk. A signed waiver might serve as proof of that assumption.