Some states ask for proof of the owner’s negligence; other states follow the strict liability laws.
How could an injured victim prove the owner’s negligence?
Show that the owner had a duty of care towards the victim.
Show that the owner managed to breach that duty of care.
Offer evidence of the fact that the owner’s breach caused the victim to suffer harm.
In some states, a bitten victim must show that the dog’s owner should have expected the same dog’s dangerous behavior.
What are strict liability laws?
Those rules state that the dog’s owner is automatically responsible for any bite that was made the owner’s pet canine. Injury lawyer in Cornwall knows that with a one-bite rule, the owner cannot be held liable for a pet canine’s first commission of an attack and biting incident. Still, the same owner is expected to prevent the commission of another such incident.
Limitations on any effort to demonstrate a canine owner’s liability
The head of a household does not have a duty to keep a pet canine from biting a burglar. The head of the household could allow the dog to attack and bite any invader/burglar.
Victim might have provoked the dog’s dangerous behavior. A judge would decide on how to rule in such a situation.
—The judge would study the nature of the provocation
—The judge would study the level of any controls that had been placed on the biting canine.
—The judge might also look at the way that the bite had affected the victim’s life. Had he or she been forced to take time off from work?
Could there be a case where the victim decided against filing charges against the dog’s owner?
Yes, in fact there have been cases like that. Sometimes the victim is a dog-lover. A dog-lover normally understands how easily a canine might be provoked. Yet dog-lovers always feel tempted to pet a canine.
A dog-lover could be someone that passed by a certain home on a regular basis. As a result, the dog-lover’s tendency to be careful might vanish, if a cute puppy were to appear in a familiar yard.
The same puppy might bite at the hand that has sought to pet it. A dog-lover’s sudden realization of his/her carelessness could keep him or her from pressing charges against the dog’s owner.
That reluctance might be reinforced by unfamiliarity with the process used to seek compensation for a relatively minor injury. Indeed, that was the case, when one mailman got bit at a point along his route. He never filed a personal injury claim. Furthermore, he chose to continue to enjoy playing with those dogs that he could trust.