Home improvement and gardening are things that many people do every weekend. Many people get the items that they need from such stores.
Yet, if your goal was to just pick up some new lawn equipment, but you get hurt while shopping, you could be in for lost wages, unexpected medical bills, and possible life altering permanent injuries.
If you are hurt while shopping at True Value, or any other store, and wish to pursue a claim, the claim will likely fall under an area of law known as personal injury. Personal injury is part of our civil law system. It helps those who have been hurt because of the negligence of another party be compensated for their injuries.
Personal injury and negligence claims have four elements. If you get hurt while shopping at True Value, or any other store, and you believe that your facts fulfill those four elements, you should speak with a qualified personal injury attorney to have your claim fully evaluated.
- True Value, like any other shop, owes a duty to its shoppers. Duty means that someone should or shouldn’t do something that will protect other people. For instance, True Value and other stores have a duty to safely stock all of their items, including heavy items that may be stacked on pallets or on the floor.
- The duty must be breached by the store in question. For instance, consider a display of 50 pound bags of fertilizer. If an employee knowingly stacked the bags of fertilizer on a broken shelf, that could be seen as a breach of duty.
- Someone must be injured. This is known as "actual injury." It’s not enough that the heavy bags are incorrectly stacked. It’s not enough if they fall over and only hit the ground. An actual injury is an injury that is physical, emotional, or financial. So, for a personal injury claim to be possible, someone must have received some sort of injury.
- The injury received must be caused by the breach of shop. If you went into the store on crutches because of a sprained knee and then either slipped on the spilled fertilizer or was hit by the falling bags, the sprained knee isn’t caused by what happened at the shop. However, if a shopper had no injuries before going into the shop and then received a sprained knee because of slipping on the fertilizer in question, that may be seen as causation. Since the goal of personal injury law is to help compensate victims of an injury, the actual injury must be caused by the negligence of the other party.
Know Your Legal Rights
If you were hurt while shopping at True Value, or any other store, you need to know your legal rights and have your claim evaluated. Make sure that you speak with a personal injury attorney right away. This is the best way for you to learn about your legal rights and protect them!
*The content of this article serves only to provide information and should not be construed as legal advice. If you file a claim against True Value, or any other party, you may not be entitled to any compensation.
