Cocoa Child Injury Lawyer

Every parent or guardian of a child learns that no matter how hard they try, they cannot completely eliminate the risk that their kid might get hurt accidentally. Despite this risk, when a reckless or careless adult harms your child in an accident, you do not have to accept the impact the accident has on your child.

Children are often hurt from vehicle crashes, severe falls, or wandering onto a property that has a dangerous element like an unsecured swimming pool. Accidents could serve as justification for civil litigation that could provide your family with compensation for every loss your child will experience. Help from a skilled personal injury attorney could be key to getting good results from cases like this. When your child is hurt because someone else behaved irresponsibly, contacting a Cocoa child injury lawyer to discuss your legal options should be among your top priorities.

When Can a Parent or Guardian File Suit on a Child’s Behalf?

Someone involved in an accident which led to another person getting hurt is not automatically at fault for those injuries in legal terms. For a parent or guardian to recover civil compensation after their child was harmed, they generally must be able to prove someone else’s negligence was the direct cause of the injury. This means proving that all the following criteria apply to the situation:

• The defendant being sued owed a “duty of care” to the injured person by meeting a specific standard of safe and responsible behavior
• The defendant “breached” their duty through a specific careless, reckless, or illegal act
• That breach of duty was the main and direct cause of an accident that likely would not have happened without that breach
• That accident was the main and direct cause of an injury requiring professional medical attention

Someone proven negligent may be liable for all economic, non-economic, past, and future losses resulting from their actions. A Cocoa child injury attorney could further explain this.

Unique Deadlines for Child Injury Claims

In March 2023, Florida changed the statute of limitations for personal injury claims. There is now a shorter deadline after an accident occurs by which an injured person must file any lawsuit over that incident. Instead of the four years that plaintiffs used to have, the filing period for most personal injury claims is now two years under Florida Statutes § 95.11.

If the injured party is a minor at the time of their accident, this filing period can be “tolled”—or paused—until they turn 18 years old. After that point, they have two years at most to file suit. This extension only applies to minors filing suit on their own behalf, so parents or guardians who intend to take legal action over an injury to their children should still contact a child injury lawyer in Cocoa as soon as possible after an accident.

Consider Working With a Cocoa Child Injury Attorney

No child deserves to be injured in any way because of an adult’s reckless or careless behavior. Parents and guardians who are not familiar with their rights may have a lot of trouble recovering fair civil compensation on their injured child’s behalf.

Fortunately, assistance is available from a dedicated Cocoa child injury lawyer with a track record of getting positive results from these cases. Call today to learn more during a free case review.