Dawson Ex Rel. Dawson v. Long

546 N.E.2d 1265, 1989 Ind. App. LEXIS 1225, 1989 WL 147539
CourtIndiana Court of Appeals
DecidedDecember 7, 1989
Docket49A04-8710-CV-308
StatusPublished
Cited by25 cases

This text of 546 N.E.2d 1265 (Dawson Ex Rel. Dawson v. Long) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Dawson Ex Rel. Dawson v. Long, 546 N.E.2d 1265, 1989 Ind. App. LEXIS 1225, 1989 WL 147539 (Ind. Ct. App. 1989).

Opinions

MILLER, Judge.

This action arose after one-month-old Garfield Dawson was permanently injured as a result of a fall out of the second-story window of an apartment owned by William Long, d/b/a Hoosier Homes, and being rented by Marvin Tardy whom Dawson was visiting when he was injured. Tanya [1266]*1266Dawson, the infant’s Mother, as Next Friend, brought suit against Long alleging four theories of recovery: negligence, nuisance, breach of an implied warranty of habitability, and breach of an express or implied covenant to repair. After a hearing on Long’s motion for summary judgment, the trial court granted the motion, finding that there was no issue as to any material fact. Dawson appealed, alleging errors which we consolidate as follows:

(1) there was a material issue of fact regarding Long’s liability to Dawson under Dawson's claim of negligence; and
(2) there was a material issue of fact regarding Long’s liability to Dawson under Dawson’s theory Long breached an implied warranty of habitability.

We reverse on the negligence issue, and affirm the trial court on the issue of the implied warranty of habitability.

FACTS

The facts stated most favorably to Dawson are as follows: On August 20, 1984, Almedia, a/k/a Amelia, McLayea took her infant nephew, Dawson, to visit a friend, Tardy, at his second-story duplex apartment at 3025 North Washington Boulevard in Indianapolis. As McLayea was leaving the apartment, she walked down the stairway, carrying Dawson in an infant seat. Before she reached the landing about four steps down from the top of the flight of wooden stairs, she caught her heel on a stair, slipped, and fell forward. There was no handrail along the stairway by which she could break her fall. Instead, her shoulder struck a window at the landing, the window broke, the rotted screen behind it collapsed, and Dawson fell through the opening to the ground below. Although Dawson was not cut by glass, he received severe, permanent injuries, including brain damage, from the fall.

Dawson offered Tardy’s deposition into evidence in which Tardy testified that he had signed an agreement with Long to rent the apartment on a month-to-month basis on May 2, 1983. (Record at p. 90); (Exhib. A at p. 120). They had no agreement about repairs, either oral or written. Tardy testified, however, that during the period of the lease Long had agreed to make repairs on the apartment if Tardy paid for them. Tardy testified that he had told Long during the first couple of months of the lease that the wooden stairs were slippery and needed some rubber or nonslip material on them, and there was no handrail along the stairs. He said his mother could not visit him because she could not come up the stairs without a handrail. Tardy said Long did nothing about the situation until approximately one week after Dawson’s accident when Long installed a handrail along the top four stairs leading to his apartment.

Tardy described the stairway as having four steps down to a landing where there was a window, and then, after turning left, there were about ten more steps down to the first floor. He said the window was about four-feet wide and six-feet high and stood about one foot above the landing. There was no guard rail in front of the window. He described the window as loose, having very little putty left around it, and the screen as being rotten. He said the whole piece of screen gave way when McLayea’s shoulder hit it.

Tardy testified further that he had complained to Long about other problems with a sink and pipe that caused leaking from his apartment into the apartment below. Tardy said Long did not take action to correct these problems until after the instant incident when Long was attempting to sell a portion of the duplex. (Record at p. 116).

Dawson also offered McLayea’s affidavit into evidence in which she stated that at the time of the accident she was not aware that the stairs were slippery, there was no handrail on the stairs, the window was loose, or the screen was rotten.

Dawson introduced into evidence copies of notices sent to Long by the Marion County Health Department indicating violations of the Health Code.1 One such notice [1267]*1267dated August 9, 1984, pertained to the dwelling where Tardy lived. Also, Dawson introduced into evidence a certified copy of chapter 10 of the Health Code which pertains to housing.

Long offered his deposition into evidence. He testified that his business was renting properties, and that he owned about 28 properties at the time of Dawson’s accident. He said that most of his properties were single-family residences and doubles. He described the property he rented to Tardy as a duplex, which he defined as “[o]ver and under units.” He said that both units in the dwelling he rented to Tardy had the same address, and that Tardy lived in the upstairs unit.

Long testified that his practice was to inspect his properties before renting them, and that an inspection of Tardy’s unit was made before Tardy’s tenancy began; however, he did not remember making the inspection personally. He said that normally before a unit was rented someone would go into the unit and look around and make a list of repairs to be done; then, the list would be discussed, decisions would be made about what repairs would be done, and the list of repairs would eventually be thrown away. He noted that he did not have a routine checklist for inspectors to take on an inspection, but sometimes independent contractors provided their own checklists. He said he normally checked to determine whether there was trash to be removed, plumbing that needed to be put in working condition, windows that needed replacing, locks that needed repairing, and to see if there were roaches or fleas. He said he would also correct any unsafe or unsanitary conditions. He said he had placed slip resistant materials on stairs in some of his buildings, but there was none on the stairs in Tardy’s building.

Long testified that he did not show the unit to Tardy before Tardy rented it, and he did not know who, if anyone, had. He said that sometimes he just left a unit open in order to allow prospective renters to let themselves in to look at a place. He said he had been on the premises of Tardy’s apartment at some time before Dawson’s accident occurred, but he did not know whether or not he was aware of the layout of the apartment and the stairway at the time the accident occurred. He said that Tardy had never complained to him about anything before the date of Dawson’s injury. After Dawson’s injury occurred, however, Tardy had telephoned him to say the stairway was a hazard. Then, Long said he had a handrail installed on the stairway in the hall between Tardy’s apartment and the landing, and he also replaced the broken window. He noted that he did these things at his own expense and without asking for reimbursement from anyone else.

Long did acknowledge that the tenant in the unit below Tardy’s apartment had complained to his office before the instant incident about ceiling leaks, water in the basement, and a bad electric switch. He said he had sent different subcontractors to the apartment to try to rectify these problems, but that the tenant would call periodically to complain that the problems persisted. He said the tenant finally complained to the Board of Health which commanded him to make certain repairs within a designated period of time, and he had attempted to make those repairs, but was not certain whether he had done so.

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Bluebook (online)
546 N.E.2d 1265, 1989 Ind. App. LEXIS 1225, 1989 WL 147539, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/dawson-ex-rel-dawson-v-long-indctapp-1989.