Your Child’s Rights After a Daycare or School Injury in New Mexico
When your child is hurt in the care of a daycare or school, you deserve answers — and your child may have real rights. These facilities take on a duty to supervise and protect the children entrusted to them, and when they fall short, they can be held accountable.
What facilities are responsible for
Daycares and schools are responsible for supervising children appropriately for their age, maintaining safe grounds and equipment, following staffing and safety standards, and addressing known hazards. When a failure in any of these leads to a child's injury, the facility may be responsible.
The records tell the story
Incident reports, staffing and ratio records, inspection and licensing results, and any camera footage usually show what happened and whether the facility met its duty. Requesting and preserving these early, before they are lost, is an important step we handle for you.
How we help
We request and preserve the records, work to show what happened, and pursue the facility with care and sensitivity. The review is free and confidential. Se habla español.
Frequently asked questions
Can I make a claim if my child was hurt at daycare or school?
You may, where inadequate supervision, understaffing, or an unsafe condition led to the injury. The incident reports, staffing records, and any footage help establish what happened and whether the facility met its duty.
How long do we have to act?
It can be nuanced — a child's claim may have an extended window, but a public-school claim often has a much shorter deadline. Because of that, it is worth a confidential conversation soon.
New Mexico law — what people ask
How long do I have to file an injury claim in New Mexico?
Generally three years — longer than California or Arizona allow. But if a government entity is involved, the Tort Claims Act requires written notice within 90 days, which is the shortest deadline in New Mexico injury law and can pass while someone is still in hospital.
Can I still recover if I was partly at fault in New Mexico?
Yes. New Mexico follows pure comparative negligence, so your share of fault reduces the recovery rather than barring it, with no cutoff percentage. The rule came from the state’s courts rather than its legislature.
Does New Mexico cap what I can recover?
It depends entirely on who caused the harm, and this is where New Mexico is genuinely different. An ordinary injury claim is not capped. Medical-malpractice claims run into a tiered cap under the Medical Malpractice Act, and claims against government entities run into separate Tort Claims Act limits. Three regimes, three answers.
What if more than one party was responsible?
New Mexico largely does away with joint and several liability, so each defendant is generally responsible for its own share. There are meaningful exceptions — intentional torts, vicarious liability, and products in the stream of commerce among them.
The driver who hit me had no insurance. What now?
This happens more here than in most states. Your own uninsured or underinsured coverage is the route, and New Mexico courts have been comparatively protective of policyholders on stacking — combining the limits of more than one policy or vehicle where premiums were paid for each.
Is a medical claim treated differently in New Mexico?
Substantially. Claims against providers qualified under the Medical Malpractice Act pass through a review commission before suit, are governed by a statute of repose rather than an ordinary limitations period, and are subject to the tiered caps with a compensation fund behind them.
Injury law in New Mexico
New Mexico injury law gives families a longer window and some distinctive rules.
- Filing deadline: New Mexico gives you longer than most states — generally three years from the injury — with a 90-day notice deadline when a government entity is involved.
- Fault: New Mexico follows pure comparative negligence, so sharing some of the blame reduces your recovery rather than ending your claim.
- Damage caps: An ordinary New Mexico injury case is not capped; medical-malpractice and government claims have their own separate limits.
- Multiple defendants: New Mexico generally applies several liability, with some exceptions.
California injury law
This is general information about New Mexico injury law, not legal advice. Every case is different.
Was your child hurt in someone else's care?
A quick, confidential review can tell you where you stand — about two minutes, no cost, no obligation.