What is negligence?
The critical issue in many personal injury cases is just how a reasonable person” was expected to act in the particular situation that caused the injury. A person is negligent when he or she fails to act like an “ordinary reasonable person” would have acted. The determination of whether a given person has met the “ordinary reasonable person” standard is often a matter that is resolved by a jury after presentation of evidence and argument at trial.
The critical issue in many personal injury cases is just how a “reasonable person” was expected to act in the particular situation that caused the injury. A person is negligent when he or she fails to act like the standard “ordinary reasonable person.” The determination of whether a given person has met his/her “ordinary reasonable person” standard is often a matter that is resolved by a jury after presentation of evidence and argument at trial.
Negligence is the legal term for any careless behavior that causes, or contributes to, an accident. For example, a person is negligent if he neglected to stop at a stop sign and, as a result, hit your car as you were coming through the intersection. A person can be considered negligent whenever he or she had a duty to act carefully and failed to do so. (Generally, we all have an obligation to act with ordinary and reasonable care in any given situation — that is, in a manner that will not foreseeably injure those around us.) For example, a person who drove at night wearing sunglasses would be negligent, because any reasonable driver would know that doing so would increase the chances of causing a traffic accident. For most types of accidents, a person must be found negligent in order to be held legally responsible for another person’s injuries. If a person behaves negligently and that behavior causes you harm, you can most likely recover compensation for your injuries. For more about
