Carlson v. Rand
| Decision Date | 10 November 1966 |
| Docket Number | No. 40071,40071 |
| Citation | 146 N.W.2d 190,275 Minn. 272 |
| Parties | Grant W. CARLSON, Appellant, v. Estelle RAND, Respondent. |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Syllabus by the Court
1. A verdict may be directed only in those unequivocal cases where it clearly appears to the court on the trial that it would be its manifest duty to set aside a contrary verdict as not justified by the evidence or as contrary to the law applicable to the case.
2. In a negligence action the test for determining whether a verdict should be directed by the trial court is whether men could differ as to the question of negligence on the part of the defendant or contributory negligence on the part of the plaintiff.
3. The cases where this court has found it a duty to warn of a changed condition are those in which the plaintiff could not discover it by the ordinary use of his faculties. There is no duty to warn against risks which are open and obvious.
4. The facts in the instant case are clear and undisputed that the rug was plainly visible and that the plaintiff did not look where he was going. Since there was sufficient lighting and the plaintiff admits that he could have seen the rug had he looked, the trial court had no choice but to direct a verdict against him upon the state of the record.
Mahoney & Mahoney, and John F. Angell and Thomas E. Dougherty, Minneapolis, for appellant.
Robins, Davis & Lyons, Roger T. Sahr and Dale I. Larson, Minneapolis, for respondent.
Appeal from a judgment of the Hennepin County District Court entered pursuant to a directed verdict in favor of defendant. The cause of action arose out of incidents occurring on June 26, 1962, when plaintiff fell and was injured because of the claimed negligence of defendant.
Plaintiff and defendant are brother and sister respectively. Their mother, Hulda Nagel, now deceased, maintained her home at 3704 18th Avenue South in Minneapolis. She had lived there for 30 years and during the 10 years preceding the accident had lived alone. Plaintiff, a pressman 58 years of age, and his sister had their own families and homes.
For about 5 years prior to the date of the accident plaintiff, defendant, and their mother would purchase eggs outside the city and bring them back to the mother's home where they would divide them up.
The entrance to Mrs. Nagel's home opened on a front porch. From there one entered the living room, the largest of all the rooms in the house. The inside doorways led from the living room directly into the kitchen and on from there into what is referred to as the 'storeroom.' The doorways between the living room, the kitchen, and the storeroom were lined up so that a person could look from the living room through the doorways into the storeroom. Plaintiff was entirely familiar with this arrangement at his mother's home and provided all the evidence concerning it. Any further description of the premises is unnecessary since plaintiff does not contend that the storeroom, in which he fell, was in darkness or dangerous in any other way at the time of the accident.
The contents of the storeroom consisted of a dresser, a table upon which egg cartons were customarily stored, and a rolled-up rug placed inside the room by defendant on the day in question to be picked up for dry-cleaning. Plaintiff was well aware of this room's use for storage purposes.
Plaintiff drove to his mother's home on the day of the accident at 1:30 p.m. to pick her up for the purpose of going to Maple Plain to purchase a crate of eggs. The mother was then alone in the home. They drove to Maple Plain and returned with the eggs at 6:35 p.m. Upon arriving at the mother's home plaintiff carried the egg crate from the car into the house, setting it down in the living room. His sister, defendant, was there but engaged in talking on a telephone in the living room at the time. The mother asked defendant how many eggs she wanted, and defendant indicated the customary 'three dozen.' The mother then told plaintiff to take the eggs into the storeroom and to put them into the egg cartons as he usually did. While his sister was still on the telephone, plaintiff picked up the egg crate, which was 13 by 13 by 12 , by the cleats at the top of the crate and carried it chest high from the living room straight through the kitchen and into the storeroom. He took three steps upon entering the storeroom and then tripped over the rug, sustaining an injury to his hip. Plaintiff admitted that there was a light switch next to the storeroom doorway and and that he knew its location, but said that he didn't turn the light on because 'it was light enough to see where I was walking.' He admitted there was enough light so that he could have seen a bushel basket and could have seen the rug had he looked.
Plaintiff, at the trial, presented his witnesses, cross-examined defendant under the rules, and rested his case. Defendant thereupon moved for a directed verdict which the trial court granted, finding no negligence on the part of defendant in storing a rug in a storeroom and concluding, after hearing the testimony, that it was wholly unforeseeable that plaintiff would not see the rug and would unnecessarily carry an egg crate of the size involved in such a manner as to obstruct his vision. Thus, because of the facts that the rug was plainly visible and that plaintiff admittedly made no attempt to look where he was going, the trial court found him guilty of contributory negligence as a matter of law.
The issue is whether or not the trial court erred in holding, as a matter of law, that defendant was not negligent and that plaintiff was contributorily negligent.
1--2. In Brulla v. Cassady, 206 Minn. 398, 403, 289 N.W. 404, 407, we stated the rule to be:
See, Coleman v. Huebener, 269 Minn. 198, 130 N.W.2d 322; Yates v. Gamble, 198 Minn. 7, 15, 268 N.W. 670, 674; Giermann v. St. P., M. & M. Ry. Co., 42 Minn. 5, 43 N.W. 483; Pennsylvania R. Co. v. Chamberlain, 288 U.S. 333, 53 S.Ct. 391, 77 L.Ed. 819; 19 Dunnell, Dig. (3 ed.) § 9764.
We have held that the test to be applied in determining whether a verdict should be directed by the trial court is whether it is plain from the evidence submitted that all men can draw but one conclusion. Thus, in a negligence action the test for determining whether a verdict should be directed is whether men could differ as to the question of negligence on the part of the defendant or contributory negligence on the part of the plaintiff. It is well settled that the plaintiff has the burden of proving that the defendant's conduct is characterized by the elements necessary to give rise to an action based on negligence:
If any of the foregoing elements is clearly missing, and reasonable men could not differ on the point, then the plaintiff has failed to sustain his burden of proof and the court is justified in directing a verdict.
The evidence in the present case would indicate that plaintiff has proved the last two elements since defendant admits that she placed a rug in the storeroom while plaintiff testifies that he tripped over that rug and, in doing so, sustained injuries.
3--4. Plaintiff contends that defendant, though not the owner or even an occupant of the place where the accident occurred, had, nevertheless, a duty not to maintain a condition involving an unreasonable risk of physical harm to others or, if she did so, at least to give them warning of it. Plainly the first aspect of this contention is based upon Restatement, Torts (2d) § 386, which provides:
'Any person, except the possessor of land or a member of his household or one acting on his behalf, who creates or maintains upon the land a structure or other artificial condition which he should recognize as involving an Unreasonable risk of physical harm to others upon or outside of the land, is subject to liability for physical harm thereby caused to them, * * *.' (Italics supplied.)
Plaintiff also contends that this duty is the same as the duty imposed upon the owner or occupier of land. That duty was discussed in Glenn v. Munson, 259 Minn....
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