Slip & Fall Lawyer in Florida

Florida's slip-and-fall law places the proof burden squarely on the injured person, and that proof has a short shelf life. Under Fla. Stat. § 768.0755, to win your case you must show either: (1) the business had actual knowledge of the transitory foreign substance — meaning a manager or employee saw it or created it — or (2) the condition existed long enough that, in the exercise of ordinary care, the business should have discovered it (constructive knowledge). The most powerful evidence of constructive knowledge is surveillance footage showing the spill sat unaddressed for 20, 30, or 45 minutes before your fall. Most Florida retail and hospitality properties retain surveillance footage for only 30 to 72 hours before it is automatically overwritten. Your attorney must issue a written preservation demand to the business's risk management department within hours of learning about the incident. After HB 837's 2-year SOL (§ 95.11(5)(a)), the legal deadline is 2 years — but the evidence deadline is measured in hours.

Hurricane Ian's landfall in September 2022 created a unique wave of Florida premises liability cases that is still being litigated. Lee, Charlotte, Collier, and DeSoto counties — the hardest-hit areas — saw thousands of commercial and residential properties sustain storm damage that created hazardous conditions for months afterward: collapsed ceilings, buckled floors, exposed electrical hazards, and water-damaged surfaces that appeared stable but were structurally compromised. Property owners, particularly commercial landlords and retail chains that reopened quickly, faced premises liability exposure for injuries on properties where the full extent of damage had not been assessed or disclosed. Under § 768.0755's 'regularity and foreseeability' prong, storm-related hazards in known flood zones are a textbook foreseeable condition. Dozens of Hurricane Ian premises cases are currently pending in the 20th Judicial Circuit (Fort Myers) and 12th Judicial Circuit (Sarasota/Manatee).

Florida's HB 837 (2023) fundamentally changed negligent security litigation — the category of premises liability that covers assaults, robberies, and violent crimes on commercial property. Under the pre-HB 837 standard, a property owner's liability was determined primarily by whether they had notice of prior similar crimes. Post-HB 837, § 768.0706 requires juries to apportion fault to the criminal actor who actually committed the assault — even if the criminal is unknown, uncharged, or has no assets. This means that in a hotel stabbing case, for example, the jury might assign 70% fault to the unknown assailant and only 30% to the hotel — reducing plaintiff's recovery substantially. However, qualifying multifamily residential properties (apartment complexes) gain a full presumption against liability if they implement specific security measures: 30-day video retention at entries/exits, lighted parking areas, deadbolt locks, and pool gates. Miami apartment complex litigation has been dramatically affected by this new framework.

Florida's hospitality and tourism industry creates some of the highest-volume premises liability exposure in the country. Walt Disney World, Universal Studios, SeaWorld, and dozens of smaller attractions in Orange County maintain sophisticated risk management operations but also generate substantial injury litigation. Hotels on Miami Beach's Collins Avenue, at Brickell, and in Fort Lauderdale's downtown corridor are prolific slip-and-fall defendants. Florida courts have consistently held that hotels owe their guests the full duty of care owed to invitees — the highest duty under common law — and that constructive knowledge of a recurring hazard (e.g., a pool deck that floods during afternoon thunderstorms) is established by the property's own history. Your attorney should subpoena the property's incident report logs, maintenance work orders, and prior insurance claims as part of the initial discovery strategy. The 2-year window under § 95.11(5)(a) applies from the date of injury.