Defense Against Gross Negligence

Gross negligence is reckless, unreasonable or willful misconduct by a person that indicates total disregard for the obligation to exercise due care and that leads to personal injury or property damage. If this claim is made, your defense against gross negligence will address four factors:

Duty of care
Breach of duty of care
Causation
Damages

Gross negligence can be claimed by a victim in any case where harm is caused if the victim believes you acted unreasonably. In fact, you may not have purposely intended on causing harm, but another person can still claim you were negligent. These circumstances include car accidents, slip-and-fall cases, legal malpractice, and medical professional negligence. The specifics of your defense will vary based on the terms of the personal injury lawsuit, but in any situation your legal case will have to respond to the four factors listed.

Duty of Care

A defense against a claim that duty of care was violated would require proving you behaved reasonably given the circumstances of the event. Reasonable care is a term that refers to how a person with an ordinary degree of reason, social responsibility and/or care would have acted in the same situation.

Breach of Duty of Care

Coupled with your defense that you behaved reasonably and exercised appropriate duty is the need to prove you did not breach a duty. Breaching a duty means you failed to exercise reasonable care to avoid injuring someone or damaging property. To not be held responsible for the damages your defense must show that you exercised a reasonable level of care and so did not breach a duty.

Causation

Causation is a term that simply means that a breach of duty of care caused the injuries or damages. Your defense will try to show that you did not breach your duty, and therefore negligent actions could not have caused the damages.

Damages

Damages are the actual physical, emotional and financial losses incurred as a result of the breach of duty. A defense against gross negligence will try to show that you should not be held responsible for the damages because you exercised reasonable duty of care.

Consult an Attorney Right Away

It is important to consult an attorney right away when persons are injured or property is damaged. If you are accused of being negligent the purported victim will seek compensation that can include both compensatory and punitive damages.

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