Maine Elevator and Escalator Accident Lawyer

How Maine Law Treats an Elevator or Escalator Injury Claim

Two Maine statutes set the frame for most injury claims. Section 752 of title 14 of the Maine Revised Statutes says that "All civil actions shall be commenced within 6 years after the cause of action accrues and not afterwards," except actions on certain court judgments "and except as otherwise specially provided." The second statute, section 156 of title 14 of the Maine Revised Statutes, sets the state's comparative negligence rule, meaning the way Maine weighs the injured person's own fault against everyone else's.

If you think you may have contributed to the accident, section 156 speaks to that worry. It says a claim "may not be defeated by reason of the fault of the person suffering the damage," but the damages "must be reduced to such extent as the jury thinks just and equitable having regard to the claimant's share in the responsibility." It then adds a firm limit: "If such claimant is found by the jury to be equally at fault, the claimant may not recover." In practice, some fault on your part does not end a claim, but a finding of equal fault does.

Elevator and escalator claims usually rest on one or both of two legal theories. Premises liability is the duty a property owner or occupier owes to people on the property. Product liability looks at the equipment itself and asks whether a defect in its design, its manufacture or its warnings caused the harm. You may also see the phrase common carrier, a term for a business that carries members of the public; whether Maine applies it to an elevator operator depends on Maine's current law. Which theory fits, and how the equal-fault bar applies, shapes almost every later question, and those are the issues a conversation with an attorney can help sort out.

What Happened to You, and Where It Happened in Maine

Elevator injuries tend to follow a few patterns. Misleveling means the car stops above or below the floor, leaving a lip or a drop that a passenger can trip over. A sudden drop is an unexpected fall of the car, short or long. Door injuries happen when doors close on a passenger who is still entering or leaving. Entrapment means being stuck inside a stalled car, often between floors, and some injuries occur during an attempt to get out.

Escalators bring different risks. Steps can collapse or separate, a handrail can stop or move out of pace with the steps, clothing or footwear can be caught at the edges or the comb plate, and a sudden stop can throw riders forward. The site's page on escalator accidents and how they happen covers these mechanisms in more depth.

These accidents happen in hotels, shopping malls, apartment buildings, office buildings, airports and hospitals. The setting changes who stands in what relationship to the equipment. A commercial owner runs equipment for customers and visitors. A residential landlord provides it to tenants and their guests. A public building operator may bring government-claim rules into the picture, discussed below, so the type of building can decide whether a 365-day notice rule applies on top of the six-year period.

The details that often help later are where the equipment was, what it did just before the injury, and who seemed to run or service it.

Who May Be Responsible for Your Injury

Responsibility in an elevator or escalator case is often shared among several kinds of parties, and Maine's fault statute addresses that directly. Section 156 provides that "In a case involving multiparty defendants, each defendant is jointly and severally liable to the plaintiff for the full amount of the plaintiff's damages," while any defendant may ask the jury, through special interrogatories, for "the percentage of fault contributed by each defendant." The same section sets special rules when one defendant settles and is released.

The parties who commonly come up include the following. The property owner or occupier may owe a duty to keep the premises reasonably safe for people on them. The equipment manufacturer or a component supplier may face a product-liability theory based on a defect in design, manufacture or warnings. A maintenance contractor, meaning a company hired to service, repair or inspect the equipment under a contract, may also be part of the picture. The site's broader page on elevator accident claims explains how these roles fit together.

Naming a party does not mean that party did anything wrong. Whether any duty was breached, and whether that breach caused the injury, depends on the facts. For an injured person, joint and several liability means a claim does not depend on singling out one company, but the settlement rules mean that how one party is released can affect the rest. When installation, inspection and upkeep were split among different companies, an attorney can help sort out who held which job and when.

Deadlines That Apply, Including When a Government Building Is Involved

When you are still recovering, deadlines can feel far away, but Maine has more than one, and missing one can end a claim regardless of its strength. The general six-year period in section 752 runs from when the cause of action accrues and applies to civil actions "except as otherwise specially provided."

A separate rule applies when the claim is against the State or a political subdivision such as a town or city. Section 8107 of title 14 of the Maine Revised Statutes, part of the Maine Tort Claims Act, requires a written notice "Within 365 days after any claim or cause of action permitted by this chapter accrues," or later within the limits of section 8110 "when a claimant shows good cause why notice could not have reasonably been filed within the 365-day limit." The statute says good cause includes, but is not limited to, cases where a settlement official or tort insurer of the government entity makes contacts implying a promise of coverage that would lead a reasonable person to believe the losses would be covered. A notice against the State goes to the responsible agency and the Attorney General; a notice against a political subdivision goes to a person who could be served under Rule 4 of the Maine Rules of Civil Procedure. If the elevator was in a state office, a public hospital or a municipal building, the notice rule sits on top of any other deadline.

Minors have their own rules. Section 8107 lets a relative, attorney or agent file for an incapacitated or minor claimant, and "If the claimant is a minor when the cause of action accrues, the notice may be presented within 365 days of the minor's attaining 18 years of age." For the general period, section 853 of title 14 of the Maine Revised Statutes provides that if a person entitled to bring an action under sections 752 to 754, among others, "is a minor, mentally ill, imprisoned or without the limits of the United States when the cause of action accrues, the action may be brought within the times limited herein after the disability is removed."

Which deadline governs depends on who owned the building and who was hurt, and a conversation with an attorney can help sort out which applies.

How Your Own Conduct and Your Losses Shape Damages

Injury claims commonly describe losses such as medical expenses, lost earnings, pain and suffering and loss of enjoyment of life. Which of those Maine law allows, and in what amount, depends on Maine's current law and on proof of each loss. The Maine statutes cited on this page set no general cap on personal-injury damages, and this page states none.

Beyond the equal-fault bar described above, section 156 sets out how a jury actually calculates a reduced award. The court instructs the jury "to find and record the total damages that would have been recoverable if the claimant had not been at fault," and then "to reduce the total damages by dollars and cents, and not by percentage, to the extent considered just and equitable." The jury returns both amounts, and the lesser figure is the verdict.

That is why questions about your own conduct often loom large: whether you were rushing a closing door, holding the handrail, or stepping off a car that had stopped out of level. Under section 156, "fault" covers "negligence, breach of statutory duty or other act or omission that gives rise to a liability in tort," so ordinary carelessness on anyone's part counts. What reduces a recovery is the evidence about how each person acted, not the injury alone.

One rule rarely fits these cases but appears in Maine law: section 159-A of title 14 of the Maine Revised Statutes limits landowners' duty for "recreational activities conducted out-of-doors," with an exception for "a willful or malicious failure to guard or to warn." Whether it touches a given case depends on the facts.

Records That Can Support or Weaken Your Claim

Because a Maine jury weighs each person's conduct on the evidence, the paper trail after an accident often carries as much weight as memory does. Much of it sits with the building. Maintenance and inspection records show the equipment's service history, though a service log shows what work was recorded, not who is at fault, and a missed entry or repair note is not itself a finding of negligence. An incident report filed with building management captures what someone wrote down at the time, and security video may show how the car or steps actually moved.

Other records stay with the injured person. Medical records document the injury and the treatment that followed. The names and contact details of anyone who saw what happened let them describe it later. Photos of the floor gap, the step or visible injuries hold onto details that can disappear once equipment is repaired.

Many injured people and families keep copies of whatever they were handed at the scene and remember who took a report. Since much of this material belongs to the owner or a contractor rather than the injured person, whether it exists and how it was kept often comes up early, and it can bear on both who was responsible and how much any recovery is reduced.

If questions about these records, the fault rules or the deadlines above apply to an accident in Maine, you can request a case evaluation to discuss them with our attorney.

When a Family Loses Someone: Wrongful Death Claims in Maine

When a family loses someone in an elevator or escalator accident, Maine law gives the claim its own statute. Section 2-807 of title 18-C of the Maine Revised Statutes applies when death "is caused by a wrongful act, neglect or default" that would have entitled the injured person to sue had they lived.

For a grieving family, the first practical point is that not every relative files the case. The action "must be brought by and in the name of the personal representative or special administrator of the deceased person." Any recovery, after funeral expenses and the costs of recovery, goes to the decedent's heirs under Maine's intestacy laws without becoming part of the probate estate, except that the jury or a settlement may allocate amounts to the estate for medical and funeral expenses. A settlement on behalf of minor children "is not valid unless approved by the court."

The timing differs from the six-year period. The action "must be commenced within 3 years after the decedent's death," except that if the death is caused by a homicide, it may be commenced within 6 years of the date the personal representative or special administrator discovers a just cause of action against the person who caused it.

The jury may award damages for "the pecuniary injuries resulting from the death." Damages for "the loss of comfort, society and companionship of the deceased," including related emotional distress, may not exceed $1,000,000 adjusted for inflation as provided in section 1-108 of title 18-C, and punitive damages may not exceed $500,000. Those limits are written for wrongful death only. Whether any award is made depends on the facts and proof. Who serves as personal representative, and how the three-year period applies, are among the questions a conversation with an attorney can help a family sort out.