In Boston, incidents frequently occur in places where people cycle in and out all day: apartment buildings, storefronts, hotels, transit-adjacent areas, and garages used by commuters and visitors. In these settings, the legal question usually becomes less about whether crime occurred—and more about whether the property had reason to anticipate the risk and still failed to respond appropriately.
“Notice” can come from many sources, such as:
- prior police reports for similar conduct nearby
- building or management complaints about doors, lighting, or safety staff
- incident logs, email threads, or security vendor reports
- repeated safety issues that should have triggered a change in policy or hardware
A common defense in these cases is that the prior problems were “too different” or “too old.” We help you evaluate what the property actually knew (or should have known) and how to present that information in a way that matters to insurers.


