Where To File Suit If Injured On A Cruise Ship?

In this article, you will learn:

• How to tell where to file suit after an injury on a cruise ship
• How cruise companies avoid or delay paying out claims

In Miami, a lot of carriers will require a suit to be filed in Miami. So, as the example of Carnival again, they require you to file a federal lawsuit in the Southern District of Florida, which is in Miami. Miami has a court, but a lot of times, the injured passengers aren’t from Florida; they are travelling down here to board the cruise from Miami, from the Port. So, a lot of times, if the case ever goes to trial, then they will be required to come down to Miami to sit for the trial and to be a part of the proceeding. Obviously, if you’re just leaving from a cruise and you live in Miami, then it benefits you because most likely the case will have to be brought in Miami anyways. But a lot of times, that ends up working the other way, where out of town folks will sometimes have to actually come to Miami.

That’s again, if the case goes to trial, which would mean that it wouldn’t have settled at that point. So, they aren’t required to come to every proceeding in Miami or anything like that, but if it came down to it, they would be required to come down to court in Miami for the trial.

Defense Tactics Or Strategies That Cruise Ship Companies Use To Delay Or Deny Paying Out On Injury Claims

One good thing about these requirements to file suit in federal court is that federal court is a much faster claim. In federal court, they have very strict deadlines once you file a lawsuit. So, a typical defense tactical strategy is to delay, delay, delay, and you see that a lot in state court with car accident cases and other types of trips and falls and slip and falls. So, in federal court, it is good because it forces the case to be pushed along. For the defense, there’s still ways that they can delay to a certain extent, but they don’t have as much leeway certainly in federal court. Still, a tactic that the defense is always going to use is they are going to try and attack the injuries that the plaintiff is claiming. They are going to try to say that you had pre-existing injuries that occurred prior to your claim.

They are going to try and say that the injuries weren’t causally related to the actual accident. They are going to try and minimize the impact of the accident. They are going to try and say that the treatment and the medical bills for that treatment aren’t reasonably necessary or causally connected to the accident. So, that’s a tactic they are going to see in basically every case from a defense perspective. Obviously, depending upon the type of case as well, they are going to attack the fact that the plaintiff was the one that was liable. In other words, the plaintiff, he or she was the one that acted negligently to cause his or her own injuries.

Like in the previous elevator example, they will also try and deflect blame onto a third party, and bring in the manufacturer and blame the manufacturer to say that they didn’t maintain it properly, or that the part that they provided was deficient, or the cruise line folks couldn’t have done anything differently to prevent the accident. So, those are more or less the common tactics that you’ll see from a cruise line or any other defense attorney once you are in litigation.

For more information on Filing Suit After Being Injured On A Cruise Ship, an initial consultation is your next best step. Get the information and legal answers you are seeking by calling (954) 379-8030 | (786) 785-2555 today.