Business Finance Homework Help

I don’t know how to handle this Business Law question and need guidance.

Bill Green was employed as a carpenter. His employer was the
subcontractor on a construction project for a five floor office
building. He was assigned to work on the elevator shaft, and he and two
co-employees placed some planks of non-scaffold grade wood across the
open shaft on the fourth floor so that they could stand on it while they
erected the walls enclosing the shaft. The general contractor provided
the planks and described how they should be placed in the elevator
shaft. The general contractor’s safety manager then inspected the
elevator shaft and the use of the planks, but made no comment about his
inspection and permitted Bill and his co-employees to stand on the
planks while doing their work. Bill was standing on one of the planks
when it suddenly broke, causing him to fall down the elevator shaft into
the basement of the building. Bill was not using fall protection
equipment. There were no eyewitnesses to the incident. Bill suffered
devastating injuries, including multiple fractures in both legs,
compression fractures in his spine, and a closed head injury that
resulted in a severe memory deficit and mood disorder.

The owner of the building and the general contractor had been cited
by OSHA three months earlier for unsafe practices, including not
requiring personnel on the job site to wear fall protection equipment,
related to different areas of the project than the elevator shaft. It
is a violation of OSHA regulations and other construction safety
standards (1) to use non-scaffold grade planks for scaffolding because
it is not sufficiently strong and (2) to fail to use fall protection
equipment when working at a height where there is a risk of falling.

Bill retains an attorney who files a lawsuit on Bill’s behalf against
the general contractor and alleges that the general contractor’s
negligence caused the accident and Bill’s injuries.

Please answer all of these questions and explain your answers.

1. What is the duty on the part of the general contractor, and was there a breach of that duty?
2. Since there were no witnesses who could testify about what happened,
   what evidence can Bill’s attorney can use to prove that the general
   contractor was negligent and that its conduct caused Bill to fall?
3. Is there any basis for the general contractor to argue that Bill was
   contributorily or comparatively negligent? What is the significance to
   the general contractor of being able to make that argument?
4. Bill earned about $50,000 per year, but can no longer work because
   of his injuries. There have been large medical bills for treatment to
   date, and Bill will have future bills. Describe all of the elements of
   damages for which Bill is entitled to recover if he proves a duty, a
   breach of duty and causation.
5. What are punitive damages and is there a basis for Bill to make a claim for punitive damages? Why or why not?