Reed v. First Nat. Bank of Wagoner

• Decision Date: 13 July 1965
• Docket Number: No. 40730,40730
• Citation: 405 P.2d 10
• Parties: Chole REED, Plaintiff in Error, v. FIRST NATIONAL BANK OF WAGONER, Defendant in Error.
• Court: Oklahoma Supreme Court

Page 10

405 P.2d 10

1965 OK 114

Chole REED, Plaintiff in Error, v. FIRST NATIONAL BANK OF WAGONER, Defendant in Error.

No. 40730.

Supreme Court of Oklahoma.

July 13, 1965.

Syllabus by the Court

1. The invitee assumes all normal or ordinary risks attendant upon the use of the premises, and the owner or occupant is under no legal duty to reconstruct or alter the premises so as to obviate known and obvious dangers, nor is he liable for injury to an invitee resulting from a danger which was obvious or should have been observed in the exercise of ordinary care. It is the duty of a store owner to keep the premises reasonably safe for invitees, but this duty applies to conditions which are in the nature of hidden dangers, traps, snares or pitfalls that are not known or observed by invitees.

2. Under the facts of the present case, absence of handrails from an ordinary two step stairway flanked by stone and brick work was not actionable negligence.

3. The presence of a handrail upon a glass door is not in itself actionable negligence under the facts of this case.

4. Where there is no original act of negligence the intervening acts by a third person would be the sole and independent act with no causal connections, unless such intervening act was clearly foreseeable and one which could have been reasonably anticipated.

5. Evidence examined, and held that it is insufficient to sustain action for negligent injury.

Appeal from the District Court of Wagoner County; C. F. Bliss, Jr., Judge.

Action by plaintiff in error for injuries incurred while departing from place of business. The negligence alleged is the failure to place handrails upon a two step descent and having a handrail on the outside of the swinging door. From a judgment sustaining a demurrer to the evidence, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Wheeler & Wheeler, Tulsa, for plaintiff in error.

Rhodes, Crowe, Hieronymus, Holloway & Wilson, Tulsa, by J. R. Settle, Muskogee, for defendant in error.

HODGES, Justice.

The plaintiff in error, hereinafter referred to as plaintiff, filed her action in the district court of Wagoner County, Oklahoma, seeking judgment against the defendant bank for personal injuries. The petitioner alleged that she was an invitee of defendant and after the transacting of her business she was leaving the premises when she was injured by the neglignce of defendant in the following manner:

'A. The door departing from said bank, and which plaintiff used as aforesaid, is raised two steps above the outside level of the sidewalk, and is so constructed that the same opens inward into said bank requiring the departing customer to pull said door inward in order to depart from the bank. It is so constructed that it has a handle on the inside for opening and has a brace bar on the outside for the use of customers entering the bank and departing therefrom. There is no handrail provided on the outside of the door along the steps for the use of customers departing therefrom and the only means of support provided is the brace bar located on the outside of the door as aforesaid. Defendant, therefore, knew or should have known that plaintiff might probably be precipitated by a jerk on the inside of said door by another customer, and was negligent in failing to provide handrails or other means for its customers to steady and brace themselves in negotiating said steps departing the bank.

'B. Said bank was negligent in so installing said door that the same opened to the inside without providing means for safe exit therefrom for its customers' safety, and particularly this plaintiff.'

To this petition the defendant filed its answer pleading a general denial, contributory negligence, trivial defect and unavoidable casualty.

Plaintiff filed a general denial by way of reply.

Upon the issues thus joined, trial was had before the district judge, a jury having been waived. At the conclusion of the evidence for plaintiff the trial court sustained a demurrer to the evidence and entered judgment for defendant After the overruling of the motion for new trial, this appeal followed.

The facts revealed by the evidence are undisputed and may be summarized as follows:

The accident occurred on January 4, 1961, on a cold, dry day at about 2 P.M. The door to the bank is glass and swings inward. It has a rail across the outside and the floor level of the bank is two steps above the sidewalk level. The entrance to the door is flanked on east side by stone pillars and bases upon which the pillars rest. The plaintiff was on the outside of the door leaving the bank with a hand upon the bar across the door, when another customer inside pulled the door open, causing plaintiff to lose her grip on the door and fall, resulting in the injuries about which complaint is made. Plaintiff was on the lower step when injury occurred. She had banked with defendant since 1956, and had been in the bank two or three times before. She had hold of the bar with her left hand and was facing sideways.

The sole complaint registered in the trial court as to the negligence of defendant is revealed by this statement of counsel:

'It is also her testimony that the only hand-hold available to her was the cross bar across the front of the door and if she had not had to use that as a hand-hold that this accident would not have occurred. That if there had been any other hand-hold provided that she would not have fallen when Mrs. Ford jerked the door open.'

Thereafter the court sustained the demurrer to the evidence.

The operation of a bank is upon the same legal plane as any commercial store insofar as its liability for negligent injury to an invitee, and this plaintiff was an invitee. The rule governing such situation is set forth in the court syllabus of Safeway Stores, Inc., v. McCoy, Okl., 376 P.2d 285, as follows:

'The invitee assumes all normal or ordinary risks attendant upon the use of the premises, and the owner or occupant is under no legal duty to reconstruct or alter the premises so as to obviate known and obvious dangers, nor is he liable for injury to an invitee resulting from a danger which was obvious or should have been observed in the exercise of ordinary care.

'It is the duty of a store owner to keep the premises reasonably safe for invitees. This duty applies to conditions which are in the nature of hidden dangers, traps, snares or pitfalls that are not known or observed by invitees.'

That the situation here was obvious and that there were no hidden...