Living in Arizona means spending a lot of time getting in and out of your car. You drive to the grocery store, head over to a local strip mall, or pull into a massive entertainment complex for dinner. Naturally, every single one of those trips begins and ends in a parking lot. We walk through these concrete grids so often that we barely even think about the risks.
But parking areas are actually incredibly dangerous places. You have heavy vehicles moving in four different directions, drivers backing up blindly, and people walking right through the middle of it all. Pedestrians have absolutely no physical protection. Even a car rolling at five miles per hour can shatter a knee, cause a traumatic brain injury, or lead to permanent spinal damage.
If a car hits you while you are just trying to walk to your vehicle, you are probably dealing with a lot of pain and a mountain of medical bills. You might also be wondering who is supposed to pay for all of this. Figuring out who holds the legal blame is not always a simple process. Multiple different parties might actually share the responsibility for what happened to you.
How Drivers Cause Parking Area Collisions
The first place we usually look after a crash is the person sitting behind the wheel. Anyone driving a car has a strict legal duty to watch out for people on foot. Period. Parking lots have their own set of rules, like painted crosswalks, stop signs, and specific speed limits. Yet, we all know people treat these spaces like the Wild West. Drivers cut diagonally across empty spots to save three seconds. They speed down the lanes. They roll through stop signs.
Distraction is a massive problem here. People check their text messages, look at their GPS, or fiddle with the air conditioning. In Arizona, drivers are constantly scanning the lot for a shaded spot to hide from the brutal sun, which means they are looking at the trees and awnings instead of the road ahead.
Backing out is another major hazard. A driver throwing their SUV into reverse has terrible visibility. They are legally required to yield to anyone walking behind them. If they fail to check their mirrors, or if they drive aggressively to beat another car to a spot, they are acting negligently. Arizona traffic laws apply on private property just like they do on the highway. If a driver hits you because they were not paying attention, they are liable for the damage they cause.
Holding the Property Owner Accountable
Sometimes the driver is not the only one to blame for your injuries. Parking lot owners share a duty to keep pedestrians safe. If poor lighting or driver distraction caused the hit, we hold all negligent parties responsible. Commercial property owners, retail managers, and big-box stores have to design their lots so people can walk through them safely.
If a parking lot is a total mess, it creates a trap for pedestrians. Think about walking out of a store at night. If the property owner decided to save money by not fixing broken streetlights, the lot becomes pitch black. A driver might hit you simply because the owner failed to provide adequate lighting. A good Scottsdale pedestrian accident attorney looks at all these environmental factors.
Other common hazards include massive overgrown bushes that block a driver’s view of a crosswalk. Sometimes the painted lines on the ground are so faded you cannot even tell where the pedestrian walkway is supposed to be. Sometimes a lot is designed with confusing blind corners and no stop signs. Property owners are legally required to inspect their grounds and fix these dangers. If they ignore a known hazard and you get hurt because of it, that corporation or management company can be held financially responsible. Taking on a massive retail corporation requires heavy legal lifting, as they have deep pockets and teams of people ready to deny your claim.
What Happens If You Were Partially at Fault?
You might be sitting there worrying that you did something wrong. Maybe you were looking at your phone when the car hit you. Maybe you were walking outside of the designated crosswalk, or wearing dark clothes late at night. Do not panic. Arizona uses a legal concept called pure comparative negligence. This simply means you can still get financial compensation even if you were partially to blame for the crash.
Let us say a jury decides you were 10% at fault because you stepped outside the crosswalk, but the driver was 90% at fault because they were speeding and texting. Your final financial award just gets reduced by your 10% share of the blame. A smart pedestrian accident lawyer Scottsdale will look at the exact details of your crash and build a strategy to keep your percentage of fault as low as humanly possible.
Insurance adjusters will absolutely try to blame you. They want to save their company money, so they will point fingers and claim you darted out of nowhere. This is exactly why you need a tough pedestrian accident law firm fighting in your corner. Your lawyers will shut down those unfair accusations, gather the hard evidence, and make sure the true story gets told.
Steps to Take Right Away
The moments right after a car hits you are terrifying. Your adrenaline is pumping, and you might be in shock. Your physical health is the only thing that matters right now. Call 911 immediately. You need police officers to document the scene and paramedics to check you out. Adrenaline hides severe pain, so you might feel fine even if you have internal bleeding or a concussion. Getting medical help creates an official paper trail of your injuries, which is incredibly important for your case later on.
If you can move around safely, start gathering evidence. Use your phone to take photos of the car that hit you, the license plate, and the exact spot where you fell. Take pictures of any broken lights, missing signs, or overgrown trees nearby. Get the names and phone numbers of anyone who saw the crash happen. Witness statements are pure gold because they offer an outside perspective on who did what. Your pedestrian accident injury attorney will need this information to help your case.
Get the Legal Help You Deserve
At Karns & Karns Personal Injury and Accident Attorneys, we fight for injured victims every single day. We know exactly how to investigate a messy parking lot crash, track down every single liable party, and demand the maximum compensation available. Our lawyers have a long history of holding reckless drivers and negligent property owners accountable for the harm they cause.
If you or someone you love got hurt in an Arizona parking lot, do not wait to get help. Reach out to our legal team right now. Call us at 1-800-4-THE-WIN (1-800-484-3946) to set up a free consultation. Let our lawyers take the heavy legal stress off your plate so you can put all your energy into getting better.
