Vacation Rental Injury

In a personal injury case, the Stanley Law Firm represented a client who was injured while on vacation in the Myrtle Beach area. Because of our experience in personal injury cases like this one, we were our client’s first step toward success.

Our client was visiting the Myrtle Beach area from Tennessee and had reserved a vacation rental. After checking-in at the vacation rental company, she was returning to her vehicle when she fell down an outside stairwell.

As a result of her fall, our client sustained serious personal injuries including a right elbow fracture, a left elbow fracture, and a left knee fracture. The left elbow fracture required a total elbow replacement which was complicated by an infection. According to our client’s treating orthopedic surgeon, there was a 24% whole person impairment related to the left elbow. Also, the left elbow physical limitations amounted to difficulty reaching and inability to lift over approximately 15 or 20 pounds.

In an effort to get a successful outcome for our client, the Stanley Law Firm hired a forensic architect to investigate the area where our client was injured. While the forensic architect was very costly, we believed that hiring the forensic architect was worth the cost and effort for our client’s case.

According to the investigation of our forensic architect, the stair area where our client was injured violated the applicable building code. Specifically, the condition of the stair tread where our client fell did not qualify as a landing, but instead was considered a stair according to the building code. Therefore, this stair area was required to have handrails on each side of the stair as prescribed by the building code, but the owner and contractor had failed to install handrails in this area.

Our forensic architect also stated that the absence of the handrails at each side of the stair prevented our client from having a suitable handhold and a visual cue that there was a change in elevation.

As a result of the forensic architect’s findings, the personal injury lawyers at the Stanley Law Firm brought suit against the rental company and stair contractor. During the discovery phase of this case, our firm took the depositions of several witnesses including a representative for the rental company and the contractor that had most recently worked on the area where our client fell and was injured.

A couple weeks prior to the trial of this matter, the vacation rental company and contractor settled this case for a six figure amount. After the settlement of this personal injury case, our client commented to the Stanley Law Firm lawyers that she never thought that she would ever receive that large of a settlement amount and was very happy with the successful outcome.