If you were hurt on someone else’s property in South Florida, a Florida premises liability lawyer can hold the owner accountable for the unsafe conditions that caused it. Property owners and occupiers — homeowners, landlords, businesses, and government entities — have a legal duty to keep their property reasonably safe and to warn of or fix dangerous conditions. When they ignore that duty, serious injuries follow. Attorney Tyson Kutner represents people injured on unsafe property throughout Miami-Dade and South Florida, and premises liability is far broader than a simple slip-and-fall.
The property owner’s duty to keep you safe
At the heart of every premises case is a duty: an owner or occupier must maintain reasonably safe conditions and either repair a hazard or warn visitors about it. The exact level of care can depend on your status on the property — whether you were an invitee, a licensee, or a trespasser. A customer in a store, for example, is owed a higher duty than someone who was not supposed to be there. Sorting out that status, and the duty that comes with it, is one of the first things a premises liability attorney does in evaluating your claim.
Types of premises liability claims we handle
Premises liability reaches well beyond a wet floor. We represent people hurt by a wide range of dangerous property conditions, including:
- Negligent security — inadequate lighting, broken locks, or missing guards that allow a foreseeable assault or robbery
- Swimming-pool accidents and drownings — Florida’s Residential Swimming Pool Safety Act sets specific safety requirements for pools
- Dog bites and animal attacks
- Falling objects and collapsing structures
- Defective stairways, railings, and walkways
- Slip, trip, and fall hazards on spills, unmarked wet surfaces, or hidden defects
Slip-and-fall is its own substantial area — if that is what happened to you, our slip, trip, and fall page covers it in depth.
Negligent security: when the danger is a foreseeable crime
Some of the most serious premises cases involve harm caused not by the property itself but by a crime the owner could have prevented. Negligent security claims turn on foreseeability — whether the owner knew or should have known of a risk, such as a pattern of prior crimes in the area, and failed to take reasonable precautions. Apartment complexes, parking garages, hotels, and bars that skimp on lighting, security cameras, or working locks can be held responsible when a foreseeable assault or robbery results.
How we prove a premises liability case
Winning a premises case is rarely automatic — the law requires proof that the owner was negligent. For a slip on a transitory substance in a business, Florida Statute §768.0755 specifically requires showing the business had actual or constructive knowledge of the hazard. Dog bites follow a different rule entirely: Florida’s strict-liability statute (§767.04) generally holds a dog owner liable for a bite in a public place or on private property where you were lawfully present, even with no history of aggression. We move quickly to gather the surveillance footage, incident reports, maintenance records, and witness accounts that establish what the owner knew and what they failed to do.
What compensation covers
A successful premises claim can recover the real costs an injury imposes on your life, including:
- Medical expenses — emergency care, surgery, and ongoing treatment
- Lost wages from time you could not work
- Pain and suffering for the physical and emotional toll
We document the full extent of your harm rather than accepting an insurer’s first number, and you can see what that approach can mean for a client in the recoveries below.
Were you partly at fault?
You may still recover. Florida follows a modified comparative negligence rule: if you are 50% or less at fault, your damages are reduced by your percentage of fault, but if you are found more than 50% at fault, you cannot recover at all. Property owners and their insurers routinely argue that you should have seen and avoided the hazard. Having an advocate who can push back with evidence is often what protects the value of your claim. Most premises claims must be filed within two years, so it is important not to wait.
Serving South Florida
From our office in Palmetto Bay, premises liability lawyer Tyson Kutner represents people injured on unsafe property across Pinecrest, Kendall, and Cutler Bay, through Coral Gables and South Miami, down to Homestead, Key Biscayne, and the Florida Keys — and throughout Miami-Dade County.
If you or a loved one was hurt on an unsafe property, contact Kutner Personal Injury for a free, no-obligation consultation. You pay nothing unless we win.
