Q: I live in a building where in order to get to an elevator at any floor, you must go through a garbage disposal area. Because of sloppy neighbors, this area on my floor is often dirty and slippery. One day I was rushing to the elevator and I slipped on a dark liquid that was spilled on the floor and fell down. My neighbors ran to my cry and called an ambulance that delivered me to a hospital. I was diagnosed with an ankle fracture and a surgery was performed. I’m still in the hospital. Since my English is not good enough to understand what doctors said, I will really appreciate it if you’d explain how serious my fracture is. The x-ray result is attached to this letter. In my opinion, if I did not rush to work that day, I probably would not have fell. However, maybe the owner of the building is at fault too?
A: According to our medical expert and judging solely by the x-ray, you have a pilon fracture of the right ankle. Pilon fracture is a fragmented fracture of the lower part of the tibia of the foot, where it connects with the ankle. You also have a fracture of the malleolus in your right ankle. Usually, such fractures require an open rotation with internal fixation of screws surgery, which, apparently, you had. Both of these fractures are serious enough and the consequences can be quite severe (at the very least the screws will most likely stay in your ankle for the rest of your life). As for the fault of the owner of the building, I believe that it was his fault as well as yours. The good news for you is that in our state there is Comparative Negligence Law. This means that the compensation for the damage to your health depends on the degree of your guilt in the accident. For example, a person was injured and the court decided that he should receive a million dollars in compensation. But the same court also figured out that 99% of the fault is on the same person. As a result, the person will receive ten thousand, which is still better than nothing. Your case is different, you hurried before the fall, and did not look (or looked negligently) under your feet – this is a minus (especially by knowing the neighbors, you could have foreseen that it can be dirty there). However, it is the fault of the owner of the building as well, as long as we prove that he did not perform his duties for providing adequate cleaning of the premises, especially those areas with a higher risk of injuries to residents (lobby, laundry, etc., including the place where you fell). With the help of neighbors’ testimony and their, or your, previous complaints to the superintendent, it should be proven that the landlord knew or should have known about the dirt on your floor. I would guess the percentage of your and his liability for the incident as 50/50. Taking into consideration the duration of your treatment, the number of missed works hours, your age, residual events and many other factors, the compensation you can get is likely going to be a six-figure sum.
