Most big game seasons pick up near the end of the calendar year and run through the beginning of the new year, leading to a sharp uptick in hunting accidents and injuries. If you were hurt while hunting, you might be wondering what your options are and whether you have grounds to sue anyone for your injuries.
In many cases, there is someone you can sue for hunting accidents and injuries. In some cases, there might be an obvious at-fault party that you can sue for an injury, such as another hunter who shot you. In other situations, it might feel like the accident was your own fault, but it could be tied to a defective product like a dangerous tree stand. Lastly, there may be some situations where the property owner is responsible for your injuries, though Pennsylvania law often shuts down liability in recreational property injury cases.
For help with your injury claim, call the Pennsylvania personal injury lawyers from The Reiff Law Firm at (215) 709-6940.
When Can You Sue for Hunting Accidents and Injuries in Pennsylvania?
As with any accident or injury case, there are often grounds for lawsuits that can help you recover compensation for your injury. This can mean receiving payments for your medical expenses, lost wages, and pain and suffering brought about by an injury. However, it is important to have a Philadelphia personal injury lawyer review your specific case:
Accidental Shootings and Injury by Other Hunters
Hunters must take precautions to protect themselves in the woods, including wearing bright colors, communicating with other hunters, and so on. However, the other side of the equation is also incredibly important: hunters must take steps to protect other people from them. It is often considered negligence for a hunter to shoot or otherwise injure another hunter, hiker, or any person while hunting, because this usually only happens when the hunter makes a serious mistake.
Not checking what’s behind their target, failing to confirm what they are aiming at before firing, moving without their safety on, or simply mishandling firearms are all examples of possible negligence that could make a hunter liable for another hunter’s injuries. If you were the victim of an accidental discharge, mishandled weapon, or even intentional injury during horseplay, you may be able to sue.
Equipment Failure and Defective Products
Many of the tools that hunters use are quite dangerous, and they come with warnings and expectations of training to help keep everyone safe. However, some products simply fail because of manufacturing or design defects that make them unsafe. For example, if your gun’s safety had an issue preventing it from engaging properly, it may be the firearm manufacturer’s fault, and they may be liable to you for damages, assuming there is no law preventing manufacturer liability for that product. More common are injuries involving other hunting and camping gear, like defective straps or seats on a tree stand that cause it to fall out of the tree with you in it. Manufacturers can be held liable in cases like these if you were injured while using the product as instructed or in a similar, reasonable manner.
Premises Liability
Most people are not fortunate enough to have large tracts of land they can hunt on. In many cases, hunters will be on property that is either owned by the government or owned by private individuals or companies that open the land for hunting, hiking, or other recreational purposes. In some cases, dangerous trails, paths, stairs, blinds, stands, latrines, or other structures might be the cause of your injury. Additionally, unmarked drop-offs, hunting traps, and other dangers could be left in the woods, just waiting to injure someone.
In some cases, you may be able to sue for these kinds of injuries, but the property owner is often cleared of all liability. The Recreation Use of Land and Water Act (RULWA) has specific language that removes any duty of care from a property owner who keeps that property open to the public for no-charge recreational activities like hunting, camping, fishing, and hiking. If you were engaged in hunting activities while injured on a property like this, then you might not be able to sue.
However, this only applies to properties open to the public for recreation. There may be different rules if you are renting the property for hunting, if you paid a fee, if you have some kind of contract with the landowner, or even if you are trespassing. While trespassing usually does not get you more rights to sue, having a contract with the property owner might. Even in cases where there is a waiver in that contract, there may be ineffective language in the waiver or legal problems with the way the waiver was written that can help our attorneys file a lawsuit for injured hunters.
Factors that Can Help You Sue for a Hunting Accident in Pennsylvania
Many hunting accidents involve questionable facts, given that these accidents are rarely caught on trail cameras and usually rely on eyewitness reports from people who were outside in the cold and perhaps witnessed the accident from some distance away or only heard the accident nearby. However, there are many factors that can greatly increase the strength of your case.
First, if you were following all applicable laws and safety standards, it makes it harder for anyone to try to push the blame back onto you. Similarly, if the person who injured you was handling a firearm illegally, failed to have a hunting license, or was trespassing on property when they injured you, that makes your case stronger.
Second, having more witnesses who can corroborate your story increases the strength of your case. If you were hunting with friends who can back up your story, that is great, but it is even better if unrelated people agree with you.
Lastly, a more serious injury is often more convincing to a jury or a court that you need compensation. While you should never fake or exaggerate an injury, courts and juries are often sympathetic to those who faced serious tragedy, and courts want to properly take care of them.
Call Our Personal Injury Lawyers in Pennsylvania Today
If you were hurt in a hunting accident, call The Reiff Law Firm’s Bucks County personal injury attorneys at (215) 709-6940 for a free case assessment.
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