Day Care Injuries

Legal Case Against Day Care Operator

Day care facilities are required by law to take adequate precautions to prevent reasonably foreseeable dangers. Often, when a day care injury occurs, it is because the caregiver has failed to abide by the appropriate safety standards. If this has occurred, you may be able to file a legal case against the day care operator or caregiver. Taking legal action can help prevent future injuries to other children, as well as provide compensation for your child’s injuries. Nothing can change the past—but the personal injury attorneys at Keane Law LLC in St. Louis, Missouri can help you get justice.

Wrongful Death and Day Care Incidents

If the worst has happened, and your child has passed away as a result of an incident at daycare, a legal claim might be the last thing on your mind. But you deserve justice, for yourself, and for your child’s memory. The lawyers at Keane Law LLC will work their hardest to hold those responsible for this horrible event accountable for the death of your child.

Day Care Accident Lawsuits in Missouri & Illinois

Our licensed Missouri and Illinois attorneys have the necessary expertise to successfully prosecute your day care injury case. Each state’s laws and regulations are a little bit different. Our attorneys are well-versed in Missouri and Illinois law, and are familiar with the local judges and requirements.

Experienced Day Care Injury Attorneys

Day care injury cases are complex and challenging—children may be too young to say what happened, and may not be able to communicate the full extent of their injuries. A child’s injury in some cases may be psychological as well as physical, making valuation of the claim difficult. In order to get the maximum amount for your claim, experts will likely be needed to establish the extent of injuries as well as the need for future care. Prosecuting liability claims against day care facilities also requires an understanding of the state’s minimum requirements for health and safety. Lawyers handling child care injury cases must be familiar with the specialized state laws and regulations in this area.

Compensation for Child Care Injuries

Day care injury litigation requires finding adequate sources for recovery–that is, someone who can pay for the damage. You and your child deserve the opportunity to be fully compensated for your loss. But individual caregivers or facilities may not have the resources to pay what your claim is worth. Your attorneys should be willing and able to leave no stone unturned in the search for responsible parties and applicable insurance policies. The attorneys at Keane Law LLC are intimately familiar with insurance law and can help assist in locating applicable sources of insurance coverage.

Do You Have Good Day Care Injury Case?

Depending on where and when the injury took place, different laws and regulations may apply. An attorney can sit down with you and go over all the important facts, in order to assess the case value. You can also fill out the form on this page, and our staff will be in touch with you as soon as possible regarding any additional information needed to determine whether you may have a good case.

In general, to establish a claim for negligence against a childcare facility, we must prove that the daycare had a “duty of care,” that it breached that duty, and that this breach caused the injury to your child. The duty of care is defined in terms of what a reasonable person would do in order to prevent foreseeable harms. In day care cases, the specific duty of care may be defined by laws or regulations, depending on what caused the injury.

Steps in a Child Care Injury Case

Before Filing a Lawsuit

Your child should complete all medical treatment before filing suit. This does not mean you should wait to hire an attorney–a lawyer can start investigating and gathering important evidence while treatment is ongoing. This includes taking photographs or video, as well as taking custody of any defective product that may have contributed to the injury. The sooner an attorney gets involved, the better your chances of obtaining all the evidence necessary to prove your case.

Once your child’s treatment is complete, your attorney will gather all the applicable medical records. In some cases, these records will need to be reviewed by a medical expert. The medical treatment will help your lawyer understand the injury and the effects it may have on you and your child in the future. This analysis will help your attorney determine the appropriate next steps, including whether to send a demand letter and whether to file a lawsuit.

Proving Your Case

In order to prove your day care injury case, we must show that the facility failed to exercise the appropriate standard of care, leading to a foreseeable injury. Determining whether this standard of care was breached often requires the testimony of expert witnesses. In addition, there must be a connection between the breach and the injury. Examples of foreseeable daycare injuries include:

• Injury as a result of staff inattention;
• Injury from unsanitary conditions;
• Injury from tripping over an object that should not be there; and
• Injury from a fall from playground equipment

These are just a few examples of foreseeable injuries that give rise to a duty of care–your case may be based on different facts. The bottom line is that any departure from safety rules (that a reasonable day care center should follow) that causes injury can be the basis of a lawsuit.

The simple fact that a day care facility broke safety rules is not enough–we must also prove that this violation was the cause of your child’s injury. In a negligence lawsuit, there are two types of causation that must be proven: actual cause and “proximate” (legal) cause. To prove actual cause, we must demonstrate the if the daycare had taken reasonable precautions, your child would not have been injured. For example, if your child became sick from unsanitary conditions, we would need to prove that, if the facility had been clean enough to meet the standard, your child would not have gotten sick.

It is also necessary to prove “proximate,” or legal cause. The question is whether the type of harm suffered by your child is the type of harm that would be foreseeable as a result of the particular safety violation. If something else happened after the violation that was an “intervening” cause, the day care center will not be liable. In the example above, suppose the child became sick as a result of an exposure to some toxic substance through no fault of the day care center (e.g., a dangerous product that the day care did not supply). Even though the daycare was unsanitary, the toxic substance was the intervening cause, and the facility is therefore not liable.

Settlement of Day Care Injury Lawsuits

The vast majority of day care injury lawsuits settle before trial. In fact, around the country, less than 5% of lawsuits ultimately go to a jury, and this number continues to go down. In fact, it may be possible to settle your claim with the insurance company for the day care center before a lawsuit is filed. Having an attorney represent you will increase the odds that a settlement can be reached, and it will also increase the value of your case. Oftentimes, just the threat of a well-thought-out lawsuit from an experienced attorney will motivate a child care provider to settle.

If you attempt to settle on your own, the insurance company or the daycare center may provide a settlement agreement with small print that can have dire consequences. For example, sometimes insurance companies will include an “indemnification” agreement that requires you to pay for them to hire attorneys to resolve outstanding medical bills. Having an attorney in your corner can both maximize your recovery and ensure the fine print in the settlement agreement will not lead to problems down the road.

How Much Does it Cost to Hire a Daycare Injury Attorney in St. Louis?

Most personal injury attorneys, including the day care accident lawyers at Keane Law LLC, will not charge you anything up front. We typically charge what is known as a “contingent fee”–we take a percentage of any money we are able to recover on your behalf. We also cover all expenses up front–these will be deducted from your verdict or settlement at the end of the case.

Why Choose Keane Law LLC for your Day Care Injury Case?

At Keane Law LLC, we take pride in putting our clients’ interests first. We understand that you have just one case, involving your precious child. Your case is not just a number to us. All phone calls are promptly returned–you will never be in the dark about the status of your case. Our personal and professional commitment is to make sure we do our very best to get the best results possible, for you and your family.