Staten Island Personal Injury Attorney
IF YOU OR A LOVED ONE HAVE BEEN INJURED IN A FALL FROM
A SCAFFOLD OR FROM A LADDER…….
NYS Labor law - there is Absolute liability for scaffold
accidents and falls from heights while working.
Section 240 Claims, under
NY Labor Law this is a powerful tool for ensuring that our clients who are
injured can obtain the compensation to which they are entitled.
In such instances in addition to any workers
compensation claim the worker can proceed in a third party actions against
the general contractor , contractor responsible for erecting the scaffold
, or supplying the and placing the ladder in addition to the owner of the
property to name the most likely parties to such an action. These third parties
are deemed to have a non delegable and absolute duty to provide for safety
for those working from heights.
In these cases where a safety devices collapses
the statute is deemed violated
It is also considered violated when the device
slips or is otherwise nor properly positioned or erected – such a s a ladder
on a slippery surface
What if the worker was “negligent” in some way
contributing to the cause of the accident?
In Bland v. Manocheria the NYS
Court of Appeals held that anything the worker does to cause the accident
can only be used for comparative fault which does not defeat a claim under
this section of the law.
One of my best cases to date concerned a Section
240 claim for a laborer whose ankle was crushed by a cement buggy that rolled
down when he was working on a ramp behind it.
We recovered $1,000.000.00 for our client
after mediation in less than one year.
My team has also had considerable success with
such claims and with construction accidents in general.