Slippery Steps

This assignment came from the insurance carrier of an apartment complex.  A tenant who was having trouble paying her rent and about to be evicted alleged a slip and fall on an open stair case.  The stair case was on a second story and lead to the ground floor of the complex.  As a result of her fall, she suffered a serious knee injury requirng two surgeries several months later.  The fall was not reported until several days later to the manager of the complex.  The tenant admittedly could not say what caused the fall but knew exactly where the fall occured.  She also reported there were no known witness although she did report another tenant helped her back to her apartment after the fall.  The fall took place during the winter season.

The insurance adjuster felt the cause of injury was a fake and suggested the injury occured away from the complex, and contrived due to the eviction about to take place.  Our assignment was to defence the alleged injury by securing statements, conducting an on-scene investigation and securing photographs.

In talking with the property manager and on-site managers, we found the tenant was sort of a loud person and often in controversies with her neighbors.  We also found she was unemployed with no other means of support.  Her rent was always late.

We conducted the usual scene investigation which looked normal.  In fact, the complex was found to be in reasonably good condition.  We secured maintenance records all of which appeared to be in order.  We then asked the tenant to show us where she actually fell on the stair case.  And that solved the mystery!

The stairs were made of 4" X 12" X 5' timbers.  Their rise was about 6" and the timbers were positioned in steel supports.  The timbers were aged and had been weathered and rounded on the front edges due to foot traffic.  We found the rounded edges were actually slippery when wet allowing the foot to slip off the edge of the step.  The steps also had no anti slip strips on them.

We determined the shoes the tenant was wearing on the day of the fall were leather soled which aided to the fall.  We also checked with other long time tenants of the complex.  They informed us the steps are often slippery in wet weather.

As it was reasonable to assume the tenant's foot slipped off the front of one of the slippery steps, the case was altimately settled to the satisfaction of the tenant.