Wrongful Death Survivor

Answer:

If a loved one has been killed as a result of a personal injury in Florida, the law defines who is a survivor. Depending on the area of law, that definition can be different. For example, in medical malpractice claims where there is a wrongful death due to the negligence of a healthcare provider, statutory survivors are defined so narrowly and much differently. You must have, in a medical malpractice case, a survivor who is either a spouse of the decedent or a child under the age of 25 who is still partially dependent on the decedent in order to recover damages. In a general personal injury accident where a death occurs due to the negligence of a corporation or professional driver, the statutory survivors are the beneficiaries of the estate of the person who has wrongfully died. Those individuals have blood relations— spouses, children, etc. For example, we have a case right now where a father of two young boys was killed. We believe that was due to the fault of a truck driver. We have the beneficiaries in that wrongful death claim of the spouse. That’s a consortium claim for the loss of her spouse at a very early age, the age of 38, with two young children, 12 and 14. They also are statutory survivors. They survived the death of their father. Those are the kinds of survivors who have claims in wrongful death actions in the state of Florida.