Dodge v. Parish of Church of Transfiguration

• Decision Date: 10 December 1969
• Docket Number: No. 685--A,685--A
• Citation: 106 R.I. 342,259 A.2d 843
• Parties: Adelaide DODGE v. PARISH of the CHURCH OF the TRANSFIGURATION. ppeal.
• Court: Rhode Island Supreme Court

Page 843

259 A.2d 843

106 R.I. 342

Adelaide DODGE v. PARISH of the CHURCH OF the TRANSFIGURATION.

No. 685--Appeal.

Supreme Court of Rhode Island.

Dec. 10, 1969.

Rosedale & Iannuccillo, Anthony G. Iannuccillo, Gunning & LaFazia, John F. McDonough, Providence, for plaintiff.

Bernard F. McSally, Providence, for defendant.

OPINION

KELLEHER, Justice.

This is a negligence action to recover damages resulting from the plaintiff's fall on the defendant church's property. A jury trial was held in the Superior Court. At the conclusion of the plaintiff's evidence, the trial justice granted the defendant's motion that a verdict be directed in its favor. Thereafter, judgment was entered for the defendant and the plaintiff's appeal followed.

The defendant church is located in Cranston at the northwesterly corner of Broad Street and Wheeler Avenue. The plaintiff, a lady in her late fifties, is a widow. At approximately 5:30 p.m. on May 12, 1967, she, her sister and brother-in-law attended a banquet commemorating the seventy-fifth anniversary of the founding of the Church of the Transfiguration. The festivities were held in a hall located in the church. Tickets for this event sold for $2.75 each. The plaintiff's sister who is a member of the church had purchased the tickets. The plaintiff does not belong to the church. The defendant concedes that plaintiff was its business invitee on this particular evening.

The banquet ended at about 8:45 p.m. The plaintiff, together with her sister and brother-in-law, left the church by going out a side door located near the rear of the church. As she left the church, plaintiff proceeded own one step and onto a cement walk which led to a sidewalk abutting Wheeler Avenue. The cement walk is approximately 3 feet in width and 30 feet in length. It is situated on defendant's premises. There is a lantern-type electric light hung over the doorway. It was on. For the most part the light's rays shone down on the step. As plaintiff left the hall, she entered into a dark moonless night. To her right was a hip-high hedge which ran along the entire length of the walk. Its leaves and bushes extend just slightly over the walk and cast a shadow on the paved surface. When plaintiff had traversed half the distance down the walk, her heel left the cement and became caught in the soil at the bottom of the hedges. This caused plaintiff to fall and injure her hip. As the result of her injuries, plaintiff suffered a loss of income and experienced two extended periods of hospitalization.

The plaintiff blamed her fall on defendant's failure to properly illuminate the cement walk. At the point of the fall, the walk was about two or three inches above the soil bed of the hedges. Had the walk been properly illuminated, plaintiff contends she would have seen the gap between the walk and the hedges, and avoided it.

An architect testified for plaintiff. He stated that the lighting provided by the church at this exit was totally inadequate and that the manner in which the soil abutted the walk created a hazard to those pedestrians using the walk.

The trial justice based his grant of defendant's motion solely on the basis of the holding of this court in White v. Heffernan, 60 R.I. 363, 198 A. 566. There we reiterated the common-law rule that a landlord who retains control of the entries, hallways and stairways is under no duty, as a matter of law, even to a stranger rightfully on the premises, to artifically light those areas if they are otherwise inherently safe and convenient.

In her appeal, plaintiff not only contends that we should abolish the rule described in the White case, she also distinguishes the holding in White with the case at bar by pointing out here that we are not confronted with a landlord and tenant relationship but rather a business invitor-invitee relationship. We think that there is much to be said for plaintiff's position.

It has long been the rule in this state that a possessor of property who rents portions of that property to various tenants and retains control over the portions thereof which are used in common by all the tenants or their guests has a duty to keep such portions in a reasonably safe condition. Reek v. Lutz, 90 R.I. 340, 158 A.2d 145; Allen v. William H. Hall Free Library, 68 R.I. 80, 26 A.2d 751. This duty also extends to those ways which may be outside of the demised premises. Lawton v. Vadenais, 84 R.I. 116, 122 A.2d 138. An exception to this duty has been carved out by the common law that there is no obligation by the landlord to light those areas under his control unless they present an unusual hazard in the darkness.

Whenever we have discussed the relationship between a business invitee and a property owner, we have repeatedly said that, while the owner is not an insurer of the safety of those who accept his invitation to come on his property, he must use reasonable care to keep his premises in a safe condition for the purpose of the extended invitation. Blakeney v. Associated Subdivisions, Inc., 97 R.I. 34, 195 A.2d 234; McVeigh v. McCullough, 96 R.I. 412, 192 A.2d 437; DeMello v. St. Thomas Church, 91 R.I. 476, 165 A.2d 500.

In ruling as he did, the trial justice actually was invoking a rule first enunciated by this court in Capen v. Hall, 21 R.I. 364, 43 A. 847. There the plaintiff had been an invitee of one of the defendant's tenants. In effect, this court said that the tenant's invitee stood in no better position than the tenant. There was, the court said, no duty owed by the landlord to "strangers" on his premises to illuminate the corridors and entranceways under his control. In discussing the duty owed by Hall to Capen, our predecessors cited Muller v. Minken, 5 Misc. 444, 26 N.Y.S. 801 (N.Y.). An examination of that case shows that it was a product of the gaslight era. There the plaintiff alleged that it was the landlord's duty to light the gas lamps in the hallways.

When the common-law principle set forth in Capen was first formulated, it was generally recognized that, at that time in our civilization, there were no reliable lighting devices available which for a reasonable expenditure of money and effort would enable a landlord to properly illuminate that portion of his property which he controlled. In fact, in 1899, when Capen was first decided, this...