Parker v. Stevenson Oil Co.
| Decision Date | 28 January 1965 |
| Docket Number | No. 18298,18298 |
| Citation | 245 S.C. 275,140 S.E.2d 177 |
| Court | South Carolina Supreme Court |
| Parties | Perry PARKER, by His Guardian Ad Litem, Nona Mae Parker, Respondent, v. STEVENSON OIL COMPANY, Appellant. |
Wright, Scott, Blackwell & Powers, Florence, Paul A. Sansbury, Darlington, for appellant.
Ernest L. Cook, Hartsville, James P. Mozingo, III, D. Kenneth Baker, Darlington, for respondent.
The plaintiff, a thirteen year old boy, was injured by a fall into an unguarded grease pit on the filling station premises of the Stevenson Oil Company in Hartsville, South Carolina. This action for his injuries resulted in a verdict against the defendant oil company for $20,000.00 actual damages and $1,000.00 punitive damages. The trial judge refused defendant's alternative motions for judgment n. o. v. or for a new trial, but reduced the verdict for actual damages to $10,000.00 by an order nisi, to which plaintiff has acceded. The defendant has appealed, charging that the court erred in refusing its motions, seasonably made at the trial, for a directed verdict as to actual and punitive damages and in refusing its post trial motions for judgment n. o. v. or for a new trial.
The filling station, known as Shell Service Center, is located in the business district of the town of Hartsville at the southeastern corner of Fifth Street and Home Avenue. It faces north on Home Avenue with a shed and covered pumps on this side. It is equally accessible to traffic from the west, having gas pumps and an entrance to the building facing Fifth Street. The filling station lot is also open to pedestrain and vehicular traffic from the south through an alley or passageway behind stores fronting on Fifth Street.
The men's rest room is on the east side of the station. A raised cement strip, about four feet wide, is adjacent to the building across the front and along the sides. It is sometimes referred to in the record as a walkway or sidewalk. However, it was not kept open for this use, and, on the night in question, it was completely or partially blocked at several points by three automatic vending machines on either side of the front entrance, containing, respectively, cold drinks, cigarettes and crackers and by other obstacles.
The grease pit is also on the east side of the building, parallel with and about seven feet from the edge of the adjacent concrete strip. It is located in an open parking area directly east of the rest room door, so as to be athwart the path of one approaching the rest room from the parking lot. With the knowledge and consent of defendant, this area was customarily used for after hours parking by patrons of a nearby movie house.
The front of the grease pit is approximately in line with the front wall of the filling station building. Four iron pipes or posts were permanently installed at the corners of the pit as supports for a chain barricade or enclosure. However, no such chain or barricade was in place on the occasion in question. The record affords no explanation of this omission, and offers no suggestion that the failure to guard the pit, or to provide any warning thereof, was inadvertent. Instead, defendant disclaims any duty to take precautions to make the premises reasonably safe for one in plaintiff's situation at the time of his injury or to warn him of any unsafe condition.
The accident occurred at about 8:30 P.M. on October 27, 1962, when plaintiff, accompanied by two other boys with whom he had attended the nearby movie, entered the premises of the defendant from Fifth Street intending to purchase drinks and to use the rest room. Plaintiff was not familiar with the station, and the location and availability of this accommodation had been made known to him by one of his companions. The boys decided to go to the rest room before buying drinks. As they walked under the shed and past the vending machines, the operator and another employee were at the front door preparing to lock it. The outside lights had been switched off but the automatic vending machines were lighted and in service. 1 Because of the presence of the two men at the front door and the other obstructions already referred to, the boys did not undertake to use the cement strip as a walkway. Instead, traveling abreast, they passed the corner of the building and additional obstructions in close proximately to it on the east. They then turned in a southerly direction toward the rest room door, which bore an identifying marker and was unlocked. 2 Almost immediately upon turning, the plaintiff fell into the front end of the unguarded pit, which, as already indicated, was approximately in line with the front or northern wall of the building.
In overruling defendant's motion for a directed verdict, the court held that the evidence raised an issue for the jury as to whether the plaintiff was an invitee on defendant's premises at the time and place of his injury, and, if this was his status, as to his right to recover damages. On the other hand, the court instructed the jury that its verdict must be for the defendant if it resolved the issue of plaintiff's status against him.
On this appeal, no challenge is raised to the court's instructions as to the test which the jury should apply in determining plaintiff's status on the premises, or to the instructions as to the law applicable should the jury conclude that plaintiff was an invitee; nor does the defendant challenge the sufficiency of the evidence to support an award of actual damages in this event. Therefore, the issue, on this aspect of the case, narrows to whether the evidence was legally sufficient to support the finding of fact, implicit in the verdict, that plaintiff was an invitee on defendant's premises at the time and place of his injury.
The term invitee is usually employed in premises liability cases as meaning the same thing as business visitor. As the term implies, this is the status of one who enters upon the premises of another at the express or implied invitation of the occupant, especially when he is upon a matter of mutual interest or advantage. The occupant owes a duty to an invitee to exercise due care to keep the premises to which the invitation extends in a reasonably safe condition for his use. Typically, this duty is owed to a customer in a store or to a patron upon the premises of any other business open to the public. Bruno v. Pendleton Realty Co., 240 S.C. 46, 124 S.E.2d 580, 95 A.L.R.2d 1333; West's South Carolina Digest, Negligence, k32; Prosser on Torts, 3rd Edition, Sec. 61; 38 Am.Jur., Negligence, Sec. 131; 65 C.J.S. Negligence §§ 43(1), 44.
The operator of a filling station, who displays merchandise for sale in automatic vending...
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