Atlanta Funtown, Inc. v. Crouch

152 S.E.2d 583, 114 Ga. App. 702, 1966 Ga. App. LEXIS 896
CourtCourt of Appeals of Georgia
DecidedNovember 29, 1966
Docket42166, 42167
StatusPublished
Cited by17 cases

This text of 152 S.E.2d 583 (Atlanta Funtown, Inc. v. Crouch) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Atlanta Funtown, Inc. v. Crouch, 152 S.E.2d 583, 114 Ga. App. 702, 1966 Ga. App. LEXIS 896 (Ga. Ct. App. 1966).

Opinion

Eberhardt, Judge.

The denial of a motion for summary judgment is itself an appealable judgment. Undercofler v. Grantham Transfer Co., 222 Ga. 654 (151 SE2d 765). 1 And see Kahn v. Grayer, 114 Ga. App. 572 (152 SE2d 10). In the case under review the motion for summary judgment and the oral motion to dismiss in the nature of a general demurrer were both denied in a single order entered January 20, 1966. The notice of appeal from this order was filed February 16, 1966. It thus appears that the overruling of the general demurrer and the denial of the motion for summary judgment are properly before us for review. Section 5 of the Appellate Practice Act of 1965 (Ga. L. 1965, pp. 18, 21; Ga. L. 1966, p. 493; Code Ann. § 6-803).

The precise questions raised by this appeal do not appear to have been decided in Georgia. Without attempting to formulate the specific rule in regal’d to the standard of care owed to its invitee-patron by the proprietor and operator of an amusement device such as that here involved (see Code § 105-401; Moone v. Smith, 6 Ga. App. 649 (2) (65 SE 712); Carlyle v. Goettee, 64 Ga. App. 360 (1) (13 SE2d 206), further appeal 68 Ga. App. 288 (1) (22 SE2d 854); Macon Tel. Pub. Co. v. Graden, 79 Ga. App. 230 (1c) (53 SE2d 371); Rogers v. Atlanta *705 Enterprises, Inc., 89 Ga. App. 903, 906 (81 SE2d 721); Land v. Amusement Vending Co., 94 Ga. App. 743 (96 SE2d 337, 75 ALR2d 788); Tatum v. Clemones, 105 Ga. App. 221 (124 SE2d 425)), we think the petition sufficiently sets forth a failure to exercise the ordinary care required by Code § 105-401. Since there are neither allegations of defective design, construction, or maintenance, nor allegations of unusual occurrences or physical aberrations in the operation and performance of the amusement device, it may be urged with some propriety, and particularly in view of the cases cited in Division 3 of this opinion, that the allegations in regard to the speed at which the car was operated are defective in not alleging that the speed was unusual or that the operation of the device was in any manner different from the usual and ordinary operation of this or similar devices. As a matter of pleading, however, we regard the allegations that defendant failed to control the speed of the cars and operated them at a speed that was “greater than reasonable” as tantamount to such allegations. Thus construed, the petition is not subject to the rule stated in Hunt v. Thomasville Baseball Co., 80 Ga. App. 572 (56 SE2d 828), infra, Tatum v. Clemones, 105 Ga. App. 221 (124 SE2d 425), infra, and other cases decided on demurrer to the effect that plaintiff’s actual or constructive knowledge, or means of knowing, of the conditions and dangers was equal to that of the defendant, barring recovery.

In addition, the petition is sufficient to withstand general demurrer for another reason. Even in the case of a trespasser or licensee, where the standard of care is less than in the case of an invitee (see Crosby v. Savannah Electric &c. Co., 114 Ga. App. 193 (150 SE2d 563) and Kahn v. Graper, 114 Ga. App. 572, supra), it is a familiar principle that there is a duty to use ordinary care to avoid injuring him after his presence and danger are actually known. See, e.g., Georgia Power Co. v. Deese, 78 Ga. App. 704, 707-708 (51 SE2d 724); Augusta Amusements, Inc. v. Powell, 93 Ga. App. 752, 755 (92 SE2d 720).

While the petition here does not allege that defendant’s servants had actual knowledge during the course of the ride that plaintiff was injured and thus was in a position of peril, it does allege that when she began to experience pain she called out to *706 the attendants to stop the cars but “was not allowed or permitted to get off the ride until it came to an end and stopped at the same place where she boarded the ride originally,” and that “although she did cry out and scream for the attendant to stop the ride or to slow the ride down the attendants, employees and servants of the defendant failed and refused to do so.” (Emphasis supplied). In the specifications of negligence it is charged that “the defendant failed and refused to heed the call of plaintiff to- reduce the speed of the car on which she was riding.” (Emphasis supplied). Although it is not specifically alleged that plaintiff called out that she was in pain or had been injured, we think these allegations are sufficient, as against general demurrer, to show that the servants of defendant had actual knowledge of plaintiff’s peril and thus to raise the duty to exercise ordinary care for her safety, irrespective of any other duty owing and irrespective of any prior knowledge or means of knowing of danger on her part. Whether the attendants and servants in fact heard her cries in such a manner as to raise the duty, and whether the failure to stop or slow the cars constituted a breach ' of this duty, would ordinarily be questions for the jury. Accordingly the denial of the oral motion to dismiss in the nature of a general demurrer was not error.

The case takes on a different light on defendant’s motion for summary judgment where plaintiff’s deposition was specified as evidence. Plaintiff testified that the first time she felt as if something might be wrong with her was after she got off the ride. In regard to her calls to stop or slow, she testified that she screamed because the ride frightened her and that everyone else was screaming and squealing as they do on that kind of ride. When asked if she screamed and squealed like all the other people on the ride, she replied: “Well, I guess I did.” When asked if she said anything or if she just squealed, she replied: “Oh, I screamed for them to stop and slow the thing down and so did my date.” When asked if she thought the attendants even heard her with all the other screaming and squealing from the other patrons of the ride, she replied: “I doubt it. I doubt it.”

Thus plaintiff has established that she screamed, not for the *707 purpose of giving notice of an injury of which she was not even aware, but in company with her date and everyone else on the ride because of the thrill and exhilaration produced by that type of amusement. In addition she doubted that the attendants even heard her. By her own testimony, then, plaintiff has entitled defendant to judgment as a matter of law on this feature of the case since she has “pierced the allegations” of her own pleading and shown that there is no genuine issue as to the facts which would establish actual knowledge by defendant of her injury and consequent position of peril.

Was defendant otherwise entitled to summary judgment? “The sole question for determination” as propounded in defendant’s behalf “is whether a person may recover for injuries sustained while riding on an amusement device where there is no allegation nor showing that the device was in any manner defective, but instead was operated in the same manner as it had been observed by the plaintiff before she chose to ride thereupon.”

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Bluebook (online)
152 S.E.2d 583, 114 Ga. App. 702, 1966 Ga. App. LEXIS 896, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/atlanta-funtown-inc-v-crouch-gactapp-1966.