Bystander's Recovery

     Negligence can cause injury or death for those who fall victim to unfortunate accidents. Elevator malfunctions, car accidents, and other accidents involving machinery can happen because an owner or operator of that technology did not take the proper care to ensure the safety of others. When someone is injured or killed because of this, their family members suffer greatly. This suffering is made worse when a family member is physically close to the victim during the accident and sees the damage as it is being done. In these cases, such a family member would be considered a bystander.

     Typically, bystanders who see someone become injured cannot take legal action against the cause of that injury as they were technically not involved in the accident. Usually, in terms of receiving compensation only the person injured can take legal action and receive payment for their damages. Fortunately, this is not always the case. Bystanders are able to gain compensation if they were in a zone of danger during the accident.

     Zones of danger are areas around the victim in which one becomes truly fearful for their own safety and becomes emotionally distressed upon seeing or hearing the accident takes place.

     For example, let’s say you are driving your mother to a doctor’s appointment when another vehicle hits your car. The car becomes badly damaged and you suffer a leg injury. Your mother is there with you in the car when the accident takes place and she sees that your leg has been hurt. She herself was not injured, but the experience of the accident causes her emotional distress.     

     In this example, you were the victim of the accident, the car became the zone of danger, and your mother was a bystander. Because she suffered emotional distress at seeing your injury as it took place, she could take legal accident against the negligent driver for compensation. 

     The Zone of Danger applies mainly to car accidents; however, there are other situations where it may be used as well. These include: elevator-related injuries, assaults, and house fires. Taking legal action based on the zone of danger has the following requirements

•  Due to the defendant’s negligence, an unreasonably unsafe zone was created in which one might expect bodily harm to occur.. 
• The plaintiff observed an immediate family member become injured due to this negligence.
•  The plaintiff suffered emotional distress due to fear or shock because the accident took place.

     Let’s use our car accident example again. The person who hit your vehicle with theirs owed you a duty of care to observe the road properly and they did not. This created a zone of danger where someone might expect to be hurt. Your mother, an immediate family member, is there with you to see the accident, and in seeing her son get injured, she becomes emotionally shocked and fearful for her own safety. This example meets the requirements for a zone of danger claim.

     If you have any questions about the zone of danger or have experienced it for yourself, contact Poissant, Nichols, Grue, and Vanier at:

Phone: (518) 483-1440

Toll Free: 1-800-924-3529

     

We have offices at:

45 Market Street Potsdam, NY 13676

367 West Main Street Malone, NY 13676

     Please be assured that whether you live in Malone, New York; Plattsburgh, NY; Canton, NY; Potsdam, NY; Saranac Lake, NY or anywhere else in Northern New York, we can come to your home and meet with you if it is inconvenient for you to come to our offices.  Then, you will see on some previous blogs a picture of our firm.

-Paul Nichols