Car damaged in parking lot

[Drew800]

My mother's car was parked in a shopping center parking lot where she works. A limb fell out of a large tree she was parked under damaging her car and one other persons. Her insurance company repaired the damage - $2500 and one week in the shop - however she is out the money paid for the deductible and a rental car for a week. The shopping center's insurance company refused her claim saying that they are not responsible because the tree must had been damaged the week before during a strong thunderstorm. They told her that they had hired a tree service to trim the damaged trees immediately after the storm and that they were not responsible for damages that occur a week later. Seems to me that the tree service obviously missed this one or simply did a poor job to begin with. Any information would be appreciated as my mom is considering taking them to small claims court. Thank you.

 

[Tracey]

Sue them. Negligence = duty of care + failure to meet that duty through negligence + damages caused by the failure. Here, the mall had a duty to keep its trees trimmed. It attemted to discharge that duty by hiring the trimming service. However, it either negligently hired an incompetant service or it negligently failed to follw up on the trimmer's work. Mom was damaged because of this. The mall is also liable under agency theory: the trimmers were the mall's agents for tree trimming, they were negligent, & that negligence is passed through to the principal (the mall).

Have Mom visit the insurance co & see if it will waive any subrogation claims if she sues only for the deductable & rental fees. If they won't waive, she'll have to sue for the $2500 also, because the ins.co will take the first $2500 collected under its subrogation rights to be reimbursed. Get their answer in writing.

Good luck.

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This is not legal advice and you are not my client. Double check everything with your own attorney and your state's laws.