Graham v. Langley

683 So. 2d 1147, 1996 Fla. App. LEXIS 12901, 1996 WL 714028
CourtDistrict Court of Appeal of Florida
DecidedDecember 13, 1996
DocketNo. 95-3036
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 683 So. 2d 1147 (Graham v. Langley) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court of Appeal of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Graham v. Langley, 683 So. 2d 1147, 1996 Fla. App. LEXIS 12901, 1996 WL 714028 (Fla. Ct. App. 1996).

Opinion

THOMPSON, Judge.

John Graham appeals from an adverse summary judgment in favor of Steak N’ Shake. Graham alleges that Steak N’ Shake breached its duty to protect him as a business invitee from the negligent act of Ryan Dwyer Langley. Graham argues it was foreseeable that Langley would drive his Chevrolet Blazer through a plate glass window and injure Graham while the latter was a patron inside Steak N’ Shake. Steak N’ Shake argues that as a matter of law, the accident was not foreseeable and that entry of the summary judgment for Steak N’ Shake was proper. We affirm.

Graham was sitting inside the Steak N’ Shake when Langley attempted to park in a parking space adjacent to the restaurant. Graham was in a booth next to a plate glass window which reached from ceiling to floor, perpendicular to the parking space. Langley testified that his foot slipped from the brake pedal and hit the accelerator pedal. The vehicle drove over the curb, across the sidewalk, and through the Steak N’ Shake glass window. Graham’s booth was knocked six feet upon impact and Graham was severely injured. Because Langley’s blood alcohol level was between .118 and .123 when tested approximately one to two hours after the accident, he was charged with driving under the influence of alcohol. Graham sued Langley and Steak N’ Shake. He argued that the accident was foreseeable, and that Steak N’ Shake could have prevented the accident by erecting a curb at least six inches high or by erecting a wheel stop or an adequate barrier between the restaurant and the parking spaces. Graham’s expert testified that the curb at the point of the accident was approximately 3½ inches high and that, had it been six inches high, it may have stopped Langley’s vehicle.

Steak N’ Shake presented affidavits stating that there had been no similar accidents at the restaurant, and that the building complied with all the applicable building codes in existence at the time of construction. The trial court found that the accident was not foreseeable and granted Steak N’ Shake’s motion for summary judgment. We agree for two reasons.

First, in order to impose a duty upon Steak N’ Shake, Langley’s driving into Steak N’ Shake must have been reasonably foreseeable, not just possible. Firestone Tire & Rubber Co. Inc. v. Lippincott, 383 So.2d 1181 (Fla. 5th DCA), rev. denied, 392 So.2d 1376 (Fla.1980). One way to establish foreseeability is to show that a specific incident occurs with such frequency that it may be expected to happen again, thus suggesting that the defendant reasonably needed to take steps to avoid or prevent the incident. Id.; see also Molinares v. El Centro Gallego, Inc., 545 So.2d 387 (Fla. 3d DCA), rev. denied, 557 So.2d 866 (Fla.1989). Here the record is clear that no vehicle previously had been driven into that Steak N’ Shake restaurant. Further, there was no evidence presented by Graham that the height of the curb deviated from the construction code existing at the time the buflding was constructed. Even Graham’s expert testified that he did not know if the six inch curb standard applied when the building was constructed.

Second, prior appellate decisions have held that driving a vehicle through the glass window of a commercial business is not legally foreseeable. This case is identical to Jones v. Dowdy, 443 So.2d 467 (Fla. 2d DCA 1984) and Schatz v. 7-Eleven, Inc., 128 So.2d 901 (Fla. 1st DCA 1961). In both cases, the district courts held that although store owners have a duty to exercise ordinary care to maintain their premises in a reasonably safe condition, they have no duty to protect patrons from injuries caused by a vehicle driven through a window and into the store. Dowdy, 443 So.2d at 467; Schatz, 128 So.2d at 904. The issue of Steak N’ Shake’s liability was one of law to be decided by the trial court since there were no issues of fact eligible for jury consideration, and the trial court correctly determined that given the undisputed facts, Steak N’ Shake was not liable to Graham. We affirm the summary judgment.

AFFIRMED.

[1149]*1149GRIFFIN, J., concurs.

W. SHARP, J., dissents with opinion.

W. SHARP, Judge, dissenting.

I respectfully dissent. In my view, the foreseeability of the accident that occurred in this ease, is a question which should be answered by a jury. It should not be determined by the trial judge as a matter of law, granting Steak N’ Shake’s motion for summary judgment.

In granting the summary judgment motion, the trial judge relied on two appellate cases it thought were controlling, and which mandated that result:1 Jones v. Dowdy, 443 So.2d 467 (Fla. 2d DCA 1984) and Schatz v. 7-Eleven, Inc., 128 So.2d 901 (Fla. 1st DCA 1961). Jones simply cites Schatz as virtually identical to the facts in that case, without any additional analysis of the foreseeability issue. In Jones and Schatz, a customer (business invitee) was injured while inside a store premises, when an automobile driven by (presumably) another store patron drove a ear from the store parking lot, over a curb (six inches high in Jones and three to four inches in Schatz), across a ten-foot wide sidewalk, and through a glass store-front wall. The plaintiff in Schatz produced an affidavit in opposition to the defendant’s motion for summary judgment, executed by an engineer, who expressed his opinion as a safety expert, that a barrier of some kind should have been placed between the parking lot and the glass to prevent cars from crashing through the wall and injuring patrons inside.

The court in Schatz declared:
[I]t cannot be contended with any degree of reason or logic that the owner of a store, by permitting automobiles to park perpendicularly to the curb in front of his entrance, or by failing to erect an impregnable barrier between the store and an adjacent area where motor vehicles are driven and parked, should have anticipated that automobiles will be negligently propelled over the curb and across the sidewalk into the entrance of his store. We are not unmindful of the obvious fact that at times operators lose control over the forward progress and direction of their vehicles, either through negligence or as a result of defective mechanisms, which sometimes results in damage or injury to others. In a sense, all such occurrences are foreseeable. They are not, however, incidents to ordinary operation of vehicles, and do not happen in the ordinary and normal course of events. When they happen, the consequence resulting therefrom aré matters of chance and speculation. If as a matter of law, such occurrences are held to be foreseeable and therefore to be guarded against, there would be no limitation on the duty owed by the owners of establishments into which people are invited to enter. Such occurrences fall within the category of the unusual or extraordinary, and are therefore unforeseeable in contemplation of the law. (emphasis supplied).

128 So.2d at 904.

In rendering its decision, the Schatz court was obviously concerned about the possible “unlimited” imposition of liability on premises owners with stores configured as many convenience type stores then, and presently, are constructed. It erroneously stated that this duty would be imposed on such store owners “as a matter of law,” since what was involved in that case was a summary judgment for the defendants.

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Bluebook (online)
683 So. 2d 1147, 1996 Fla. App. LEXIS 12901, 1996 WL 714028, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/graham-v-langley-fladistctapp-1996.