Tucker v. Shoemake
Decision Date | 18 May 1999 |
Docket Number | No. 120,120 |
Citation | 354 Md. 413,731 A.2d 884 |
Parties | Gerald TUCKER et ux. v. Charles SHOEMAKE d/b/a Rio Vista Plaza. |
Court | Maryland Court of Appeals |
Nicholas D. Cowie (T. Allen Mott, Cowie & Mott, P.A.; Joseph H. Ostad, Joseph H. Ostad, P.A., on brief), Baltimore, for appellants. Margaret Fonshell Ward (Semmes, Bowen & Semmes, on brief), Towson, for appellee.
Argued before BELL, C.J., and ELDRIDGE, RODOWSKY, CHASANOW, RAKER, WILNER and CATHELL, JJ.
In this personal injury case we hold that the defense known as the "Fireman's Rule" is not applicable.
Rio Vista Plaza is a privately owned trailer park community located in Lothian, Maryland. The appellee, Charles Shoemake (Shoemake), is the owner of Rio Vista Plaza. One of the four streets in the trailer park is Jeannie's Court. Within a few feet from this street and immediately in front of one of the trailer homes is a square metal plate which covers an underground compartment that contained valves previously used for water supply and regulation in the trailer park.
Around midnight on September 15, 1996, Gerald Tucker, one of the appellants, and Keith Hoffman, both police officers with the Anne Arundel County Police Department, were dispatched to one of the trailer homes on Jeannie's Court in response to a domestic dispute. Officer Tucker parked his police car on the street, got out of the car, and began walking toward the trailer home. Officer Tucker said that the lighting in the area was "minimal." He was carrying his flashlight, but he did not turn it on for his own protection. On deposition Officer Tucker explained:
"I'm using officer-survival techniques going on a violent domestic, being cognizant of staying out of any light if there is any and making a tactical approach, staying out of the fatal funnel.
....
As Officer Tucker walked from the street onto the grass covered common area between the street and the trailer home, he unknowingly stepped on the metal cover. The cover gave way, and he fell into the underground valve compartment. Officer Tucker describes the incident as follows:
The morning following his fall Officer Tucker returned to the site and saw children's toys in the underground valve compartment. He states that Darla Sipe, the manager of the Rio Vista Plaza, told him that morning that "`the manhole has been there at the location for a long time and kids are always playing in the manhole without the cover on top,'" and that she had "`told Charles Shoemake ... on numerous prior occasions that the manhole cover posed a serious danger to kids and people may fall into the manhole and injure themselves.'" Officer Tucker further stated that the manager told him that "`Mr. Shoemake did not consider the manhole to be a danger [and] she could not understand why Mr. Shoemake had not already secured the cover since the valves in the manhole were already moved to another building across the street.'" Officer Tucker was injured by the fall and states that according to his doctors he will not be able to return to police duties.
Officer Tucker and the other appellant, his wife, Darlene Tucker, filed suit in the Circuit Court for Prince George's County against Shoemake d/b/a Rio Vista Plaza, alleging negligence, breach of duty to warn, gross negligence, and loss of consortium.
Shoemake moved for summary judgment on the grounds that the Tuckers' claims are barred by the Fireman's Rule and that the Tuckers failed to produce legally sufficient evidence of Shoemake's negligence. The Tuckers opposed the motion.
At the hearing on the motion in the circuit court Shoemake stated that "obviously the primary basis for the motion is the fireman's rule." The court entered summary judgment in favor of Shoemake, reasoning that although there was evidence that Shoemake knew of the recurrent problem with the metal cover, he did not know that Officer Tucker would be coming onto the property on that particular night and, therefore, Shoemake had no opportunity to warn Officer Tucker of the dangerous condition. Specifically, the court stated:
After the Tuckers unsuccessfully moved to alter or amend the judgment, they timely appealed to the Court of Special Appeals. Prior to consideration of this matter by the Court of Special Appeals, this Court issued a writ of certiorari on our own motion.
The following questions are presented for review:
These questions may be restated as follows:
"Did the circuit court err in granting summary judgment on the ground that the Fireman's Rule precluded the Tuckers' recovery?"
Both parties have interpreted the circuit court's decision to be that the Fireman's Rule bars the Tuckers' cause of action. No issue is raised as to the circuit court's analysis that the defendant did not have an opportunity to warn Officer Tucker because he had no actual knowledge of the police officer's presence on the premises.1
Under Maryland common law, the Fireman's...
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