1-800-920-8165
The law does not hand to those that have sustained an accidental injury the ability to file one of two types of claims, so that the same injured victim can gain a sense of revenge. Instead, the claims filed by various victims are supposed to help each victim gain a fair compensation. In the eyes of the law, a fair compensation should allow the claimant to get back to where he or she was before the accident.
Still, a plaintiff can claim negligence by the opposing party. Of course, making such a charge does not guarantee the ability to prove that same allegation. In Ontario, the legal system has established the guidelines for proving negligence by the opposing party.
First a victim and lawyer must decide which of the 2 types of negligence will be claimed in their lawsuit.
Will Injury Lawyer in Sudbury be filing an intentional tort claim on behalf of the plaintiff? That charges the defendant with having harmed the plaintiff on purpose.
Will the two of them be filing an unintentional tort claim? That alleges that the defendant’s negligence caused the plaintiff to be harmed.
How plaintiff’s allegation must get proved
It must be shown that the defendant had a duty of care towards the plaintiff. A bystander at a sporting event cannot get blamed for the injury to one of the players, unless that same bystander had chosen to step onto the playing field, or had walked into the players’ locker room. Even then, the court would want to know why the facility allowed bystanders to have such ready access to those locations.
Next, the plaintiff must present proof of the defendant’s failure to fulfill his or her duty. Was the defendant careless and neglectful, with respect to that same duty?
Finally, the plaintiff’s case will be found baseless, if it cannot be proven that the defendant’s negligence caused the injury suffered by the same plaintiff. In other words, an observation that the defendant’s actions merely came close to causing that particular injury will not get recognized as the required proof.
The role of evidence
Both plaintiffs and defendants must gather the evidence that can help them to prove their case. For a plaintiff such evidence might include medical reports, police reports, receipts, bills and expert witnesses. In addition, a lawyer-plaintiff team might present pictures or videos that help to prove their case.
Either side could support its claims with statements from witnesses, those that saw the injury-creating accident. The court will look closely at the location of each witness, when the accident took place. A defendant will not have strong case if the only witness to a collision was a passenger in the defendant’s car. The best witnesses have no ties to either party.