Proving Innocence When Being Blamed For A Fall

If you own a small business of your own and someone claims they had fallen on the premises resulting in an injury, you may want to prove the person had made up this claim in order to collect insurance benefits. While insurance will handle the perpetrator's claims if it is not verified to be a false incident, your premiums may be raised and your reputation will be tarnished. Here are some steps to take to prove the person who had fallen was not really a victim but rather someone making false claims to cheat the system.

Obtain An Attorney

Call an attorney specializing in personal injury matters. They will be able to help you prove the person is falsifying their injuries by showing the tactics used before the fall had occurred were under ill intentions. Along with any evidence collected, the lawyer will be able to fight the claim so you are not responsible for paying for the person's unneeded hospital bills. An attorney can also obtain a private investigator to watch the person who had fallen, possibly catching them doing something strenuous that would not be able to be done if they were indeed injured.

Find Any Witnesses

Ask any employees if they had noticed strange behavior displayed by the perpetrator in the minutes before their alleged fall. Find out if there were any customers who may had seen something suspicious as well. Someone may have seen the person put something on the floor themselves in an attempt to make it look like it was already present when they had fallen.

Check For Surveillance

If you use security cameras, check footage for any behavior indicating the fall had been staged. Check any saved footage for several days before the date of the fall, as the perpetrator may have been in the building beforehand casing it out for a good spot to perform their act. Surveillance footage can also be used to find out who else was on the premises during the incident. Have employees watch the footage with you in an attempt to identify customers by name so they can be tracked down to use as witnesses if necessary.

Gather Documentation

If you have a maintenance service tend to the floors in your establishment, have them give you a report about the work in the area where the person had pretended to become injured. Someone may have cleaned this spot close to the time the incident occurred, proving there was nothing present in the area to trip upon. Take photographs of the area to show to a courtroom if necessary. Have employees write statements about the condition of the area the day the incident occurred as well so it is documented by several people there was nothing harmful in that area.