Hage v. Stade

304 N.W.2d 283, 1981 Minn. LEXIS 1211

• Court: Supreme Court of Minnesota
• Decided: February 27, 1981
• Docket: 50243
• Status: Published

Opinions

TODD, Justice.

Plaintiffs, as trustees for the heirs of 13 people who died in a hotel fire on January 28, 1977, brought wrongful death actions against the owner of the hotel (Catherine Stade, d. b. a. Stratford Hotel); the City of Breckenridge, where the hotel was located; the State of Minnesota; the Minnesota Department and Commissioner of Public Safety; the Department of Public Health; the Office of State Fire Marshal; and Wesley Werner, individually and as State Fire Marshal. The District Court of Wilkin County granted summary judgment to defendants City of Breckenridge, the State of Minnesota, and all state agencies.

Plaintiffs appeal from the portion of the trial court’s order granting summary judgment to the State of Minnesota and its agencies. We affirm.

The Stratford Hotel in Breckenridge, Minnesota, caught fire in the early hours of January 28, 1977. Plaintiffs’ decedents were guests in the hotel that night. One hotel guest who was awakened by the fire was rescued from his room. The other guests, as well as a hotel employee and Catherine Stade, the owner of the hotel, died in the fire.

None of the persons present at the scene of the fire heard an alarm from the hotel before or during the fire. The only alarm in the hotel was a manual one. The alarm switch was located approximately 10 feet from the desk in the hotel lobby. Catherine Stade was stationed at the hotel desk that night. She was 81 years old, partially crippled, and apparently was overcome by smoke before she could get to the fire alarm.

The actual source of the fire is unknown, but several witnesses testified that it may have been caused by arson. Factors which might have contributed to the spread of the blaze and the lack of warning to the occupants of the hotel include the absence of smoke detectors and sprinklers in the hotel, the wooden interior construction, open stairwells and transoms above room doors, and flammable materials stored in the basement of the hotel.

The Stratford was last inspected by Deputy State Fire Marshal C. C. Tallman on June 11, 1975. This was several months before the Uniform Fire Code was adopted in Minnesota by the Commissioner of Public Safety through the Division of the Fire Marshal on October 3, 1975. The Stratford was not inspected by a state official subsequent to this time, although it was inspected by the Fire Chief of Breckenridge, Richard Thompson, in June 1976. In the past, when Tallman had mentioned potential fire hazards to Stade after his inspections, she usually corrected them promptly.

The issue presented is: Did the trial court properly grant respondents’ motion for summary judgment on the issue of the liability of the State of Minnesota and its agents for alleged negligent fire safety inspection and enforcement at the Stratford Hotel?

The thrust of plaintiffs’ claims is that the State of Minnesota and its agents negligently failed to enforce proper fire safety measures at the Stratford Hotel and that this failure directly contributed to the death of plaintiffs’ decedents. Plaintiffs argue that state agents failed to perform a required annual inspection of the hotel, negligently conducted the inspections that did take place, and failed to require correction of safety hazards known to them. The trial court did not reach the issue of whether respondents had been negligent. Instead, the trial court concluded that the state had undertaken to enact fire safety regulations and perform inspections for the benefit of the public as a whole and not to protect a particular class of persons. Therefore, negligent inspection by a state agency did not breach a duty to third parties, and the third parties (here, plaintiffs) did not have a cause of action against the state. We agree with the trial court that the state can only be liable for negligent omissions if it owes a special duty to a particular class of persons.

The distinction between a public duty and a special duty was recently discussed and reaffirmed by this court in Cracraft v. City of St. Louis Park, 279 N.W.2d 801 (Minn.1979). In Cracraft, the City of St. Louis Park had enacted a fire prevention ordinance which provided that all places of public assembly must be inspected at least once every month. Pursuant to the ordinance, a city inspector inspected a high school. He found no major violations, and sent a letter to school officials outlining the minor violations that he had discovered. Forty-four days after his inspection, a large drum of duplicating fluid ignited on the loading dock of the school, which was adjacent to the football field. Two students were killed and a third was severely injured. The presence of the drum on the dock was a violation of the city fire code.

This court held in Cracraft that although the common-law doctrine of sovereign immunity from tort liability had been abolished by the Minnesota Legislature, Minn.Stat. § 3.736 (1978), in response to our decision in Nieting v. Blondeil, 306 Minn. 122, 235 N.W.2d 597 (1975), the distinction between public duties and special duties is still valid. A duty owed to the public in general cannot be the basis of a negligence action, but a special duty owed to individual members of the public or to a special class can be the basis of such a claim. As stated in Cracraft:

[A] municipality does not owe any individual a duty of care merely by the fact that it enacts a general ordinance requiring fire code inspection or by the fact that it undertakes an inspection for fire code violations. A duty of care arises only when there are additional indicia that the municipality has undertaken the responsibility of not only protecting itself, but also undertaken the responsibility of protecting a particular class of persons from the risks associated with the fire code violations.

279 N.W.2d at 806.

The Cracraft opinion enumerates four factors that should be considered in determining whether a government entity has assumed a special duty to act for the protection of others: first, the government’s knowledge of the dangerous condition; second, reasonable reliance by persons on the government’s representations and conduct (not reliance on the inspections in general, but on specific actions or representations which cause the persons to forego other alternatives for protecting themselves); third, an ordinance or statute setting forth mandatory acts clearly for the protection of a particular class of persons; and finally, the government’s use of due care to avoid increasing the risk of harm. 279 N.W.2d at 806-07.

Applying our analysis in Cracraft to the instant case, we conclude that the trial court was correct in holding that the second and fourth factors are not present; namely, specific reliance on the government’s representations, and a lack of due care by the government which increased the risk of harm.

In Cracraft, the law under consideration was a city ordinance that required the city to inspect and correct fire code violations in places of public assembly. We found that the ordinance did not create a mandatory duty for the benefit of a particular class of persons as follows:

The municipality’s own ordinances require that it undertake inspections for fire code violations. However, such inspections are required for the purpose of protecting the interests of the municipality as a whole against the fire hazards of the person inspected. The inspections are not undertaken for the purpose of assuring either the person inspected or third persons that the building is free from all fire hazards, just as the state’s issuance of a driver’s license is no assurance that the licensed person will be a safe driver. Because the ordinances are designed to protect the municipality’s own interests, rather than the interests of a particular class of individuals, only a “public” duty to inspect is created.

279 N.W.2d at 805 (footnote omitted). Similarly, in Hoffert v. Owatonna Inn Towne Motel, Inc., 293 Minn. 220, 199 N.W.2d 158 (1972), we held that a building code ordinance did not create a special duty owed to the plaintiffs and stated:

Building codes, thé issuance of building permits, and building inspections are devices used by municipalities to make sure that construction within the corporate limits of the municipality meets the standards established. As such, they are designed to protect the public and are not meant to be an insurance policy by which the municipality guarantees that each building is built in compliance with the building codes and zoning codes.

293 Minn. at 223, 199 N.W.2d at 160. The same result is required with respect to Minn.Stat. § 299F.46, subd. 2 (1976) under consideration here. This statute establishes general fire inspection and fire code enforcement requirements that are applicable to “hotels” within the statutory definition. As in Cracraft, it is apparent that the statute benefits the public as a whole protecting against fire hazards associated with “hotels.” There is no indication that the state, by the enactment of this statute, has voluntarily assumed “the responsibility of protecting a particular class of persons from the risks associated with fire code violations.” 279 N.W.2d at 806.

It is argued that this statute is distinguishable from the ordinances considered in Cracraft and Hoffert because it concerns “hotels” while the Cracraft and Hoffert ordinances covered a broader category of buildings. The mere fact that a statute addresses fire hazards in a narrower category of buildings, however, should not alone be determinative of whether the state has voluntarily assumed a duty to a particular class of persons. A fire inspection statute that addresses a certain category of buildings may be so written merely because of the recognition that different types of buildings have varying fire hazards. It is also argued that the statute creates a special duty because it identifies a particular class of persons; namely, persons who pay for sleeping accommodations. It is apparent that the statute protects not only persons who pay to sleep in hotels, but also hotel restaurant patrons, persons who visit the hotel, persons who attend meetings there, and even neighboring buildings which are potentially harmed by hotel fires. As such, the statute protects the state; that is, the public as a whole. Thus, the failure to comply with the statute may not be a basis for imposing liability on the state.

The cases which the appellants cite in support of their position are completely in-apposite to the case at hand. Campbell v. City of Bellvue, 85 Wash.2d 1, 530 P.2d 234 (1975), second appeal on other grounds, 86 Wash.2d 572, 546 P.2d 922 (1976), involved a suit against a city for failure of the city to assure compliance with its electrical code that resulted in the electrocution of two children. The opinion indicates that, prior to accident involved therein, a city inspector had discovered the electrical code violation but then failed to disconnect the nonconforming wiring or require a correction of the violation. It was further shown that the city had assured the plaintiffs through a neighbor that the nonconforming situation had been corrected and that the plaintiffs had relied on these assurances. The court relied on these specific facts of knowledge by the city and reliance by the plaintiffs in determining that a special relationship between the city and the plaintiffs existed and that, therefore, the city owed a duty to plaintiffs to assure compliance with the city’s electrical code. No facts indicating knowledge or reliance are present in this case.

Runkel v. City of New York, 282 App. Div. 173, 123 N.Y.S.2d 485 (1953), affirmed on second appeal on other grounds sub nom., Runkel v. Homelsky, 286 App.Div. 1101, 145 N.Y.S.2d 729 (1955), involved a suit against a city for injuries sustained by children when an abandoned building collapsed. A city inspector had previously found the building not to be in compliance with the city code and had recommended that the building be secured or demolished. Thereafter, no further action was taken by the city prior to the building’s collapse. As in Campbell, the court emphasized the knowledge of the city in determining that the city had violated a duty to plaintiffs to abate the dangerous conditions.

The case of McCorkell v. City of Northfield, 266 Minn. 267, 123 N.W.2d 367 (1963), second appeal affirmed on other grounds, 272 Minn. 24, 136 N.W.2d 840 (1965), involved the asserted liability of a municipality for a breach of duty in the operation of its jail. In that case, a prisoner died as a result of asphyxiation caused by a fire in an unattended jail. A Minnesota statute required that a custodian be on duty at all times in a jail. This court held that this statute clearly imposed a duty of care for the benefit of prisoners. McCorkell, however, did not involve the duty of a governmental entity to assure that third persons comply with its laws, which is involved in this case. Instead, it concerned a primary governmental duty to comply with laws concerning a facility that was owned and operated by the city. This duty is analogous to that of a private person to maintain, in compliance with the laws, buildings over which the person has a proprietary interest. See Lorshbough v. Township of Buzzle, 258 N.W.2d 96 (Minn.1977).¹

We hold as a matter of law that there are no facts indicating actual knowledge in this case. The record indicates that, although Deputy Fire Marshal Tail-man had inspected the Stratford Hotel in the past, a state inspector had not been to the hotel since the enactment of the Uniform Fire Code. No claim is made by plaintiffs that the Stratford failed to meet the former fire safety requirements of Minn. Stat. §§ 157.01-.14 (1974). Thus, there is no evidence that the state had actual knowledge of any dangerous conditions which were violations of any fire code and which would serve to impose a special duty on the state under the first Cracraft factor.²

Based on the foregoing, the judgment of the trial court is affirmed.

1 . Cracraft v. City of St. Louis Park, 279 N.W.2d 801, 807, n. 10 (Minn.1979), may have overstated the significance of Campbell v. City of Bellevue, 85 Wash.2d 1, 530 P.2d 234 (1975), Runkel v. City of New York, 282 App.Div. 173, 123 N.Y.S.2d 485 (1953), and McCorkell v. City of Northfield, 266 Minn. 267, 123 N.W.2d 367 (1963), decisions discussed above, by suggesting that liability was imposed on the municipalities in those cases merely because those municipalities had violated laws which were created for the benefit of a particular class of persons. In Campbell and Runkel, liability was imposed because each municipality owed a duty to the plaintiffs not simply because an ordinance created a mandatory duty on it, but because the municipality had specific knowledge of code violations and/or because of plaintiffs’ reliance. The McCorkell case involved a different type of duty created by statute than the duty of assuring that third persons comply with the law.

2 . In considering the knowledge factor, we decline to accept the view that a special duty may be created based on a finding of constructive knowledge on the part of the state or its agent. This suggestion clearly contravenes our holding in Cracraft. There, we held that a special duty could only be created if the state had actual knowledge of a violation of a law constituting a dangerous condition. 279 N.W.2d at 806.