Jones v. Parish of Jefferson

665 So. 2d 570, 95 La.App. 5 Cir. 659, 1995 La. App. LEXIS 3390, 1995 WL 697946
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedNovember 28, 1995
DocketNo. 95-CA-659
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 665 So. 2d 570 (Jones v. Parish of Jefferson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Jones v. Parish of Jefferson, 665 So. 2d 570, 95 La.App. 5 Cir. 659, 1995 La. App. LEXIS 3390, 1995 WL 697946 (La. Ct. App. 1995).

Opinion

GOTHARD, Judge.

This is an appeal by the plaintiffs, Catherine and Charles Jones, of a trial court judgment in favor of the defendant, Jefferson Parish. For the following reasons, we affirm.

FACTS

On January 24, 1991, Mrs. Jones went to the West Bank Regional Library to return a book. While crossing the terrazzo floor in the rotunda of the library, she fell and suffered a broken ankle. As a result, the plaintiffs brought suit against Jefferson Parish alleging that the terrazzo floor was defective and created an unreasonable risk of harm to Mrs. Jones.

At trial, Mrs. Jones testified that it had rained earlier on the day of her accident but that it was not raining at the time she entered the library. Mrs. Jones stated that upon entering the library she did not wipe her feet as she crossed a carpeted area which surrounds the terrazzo floor. In regards to the fall itself, Mrs. Jones stated that she had walked one or two steps on the terrazzo floor when shejjfell forward, ending up with her face against the floor. However, Mrs. Jones testified that she did not know why she had fallen.

Gloria Small, a library custodial worker, testified that she had checked the area of the floor where Mrs. Jones was injured approximately twenty minutes before the accident. At that time, there was no water or foreign substance on the floor. Jane Sandler, the manager of the library, testified that immediately after the accident she checked the floor and found it to be clear and dry. Ms. Small further testified that she cleaned the terrazzo floor every other day with clear water, and that wax was never applied to the floor.

The plaintiffs sought to introduce evidence of subsequent slip and fall accidents which had occurred on the terrazzo floor. However, the trial court excluded this evidence on [572]*572the basis that it was not relevant to Mrs. Jones’s fall. Further, the court excluded evidence that, after Mrs. Jones’s accident, the defendant placed mats on the floor in the area where the accident occurred.

Charles Prewitt, who was accepted by the trial court as an expert in mechanical engineering, testified for the. defendant. Mr. Prewitt performed a test in May of 1994 to determine the amount of traction afforded by the terrazzo floor. Based on his test, Mr. Prewitt concluded that not only was the floor not unreasonably dangerous, but that it was in fact a slip resistant surface.

Based on the foregoing, the trial court concluded that the terrazzo floor was not inherently dangerous nor did it create an unreasonable risk of harm to Mrs. Jones. Instead, the court found it more likely that Mrs. Jones had tripped over her own feet. Thus, the court ruled in favor of the defendant. From this judgment, the plaintiffs have appealed.

\JSSUES

The plaintiffs have presented the following issues for our review: (1) whether the trial court erred in concluding that Mrs. Jones tripped rather than slipped; (2) whether the trial court erred in excluding evidence of subsequent accidents which occurred on the terrazzo floor; (3) whether the trial court erred in excluding evidence of subsequent remedial measures taken by the defendant; and (4) whether the trial court erred in relying on the expert testimony of Mr. Prewitt.

ANALYSIS

The trial court’s judgment is based primarily on its belief that Mrs. Jones tripped rather than slipped on the terrazzo floor. Therefore, we will first address whether the trial court erred in determining that Mrs. Jones tripped. The trial court’s finding on this issue is factual and, as such, is subject to the manifest error standard of review. Rosell v. ESCO, 549 So.2d 840, 844-45 (La.1989). The plaintiffs assert that there is no evidence in the record to support the trial court’s finding that Mrs. Jones tripped. The record reveals that Mr. Prewitt, the defendant’s expert witness, testified that the difference between a “slip” and a “trip” is that with a slip a person tends to fall backward while with a trip a person tends to fall forward. The defense counsel asked Mr. Prewitt if he had an opinion as to whether Mrs. Jones had slipped or tripped. However, the counsel for the plaintiffs objected to the question, causing it to be withdrawn. Thus, the plaintiffs argue that there is no evidence in the record as to whether Mrs. Jones slipped or tripped.

We disagree. Mrs. Jones did not testify that the floor was slippery; in fact, she stated that she did not know why she had fallen. Additionally, Mrs. Jones testified that she fell forward, which is consistent with tripping as opposed to slipping. Moreover, the record reveals that there was no water or foreign substance |son the floor which would have caused Mrs. Jones to slip. Based on the foregoing, we find no manifest error in the trial court’s ruling that Mrs. Jones tripped rather than slipped.

The plaintiffs next contend that the trial court erred in excluding evidence of three subsequent slip and fall accidents which occurred on the terrazzo floor. The trial court excluded the evidence of subsequent accidents on the basis that it was not relevant to Mrs. Jones’s fall. Louisiana jurisprudence establishes that evidence of prior accidents is admissible to show that a defendant had knowledge of a particular condition; subsequent accidents, on the other hand, are not relevant for this purpose. Lee v. K-Mart Corp., 483 So.2d 609, 612-13 (La.App. 1st Cir.1985), writ denied, 484 So.2d 661 (La.1986). However, evidence of subsequent accidents is relevant to establish that a thing is defective, provided that the accidents occurred at substantially the same place and under substantially the same conditions and are caused by the same or a similar defect as the accident sued upon. Id.; Creppel v. Louisiana Power and Light Co., 514 So.2d 239, 245 (La.App. 5th Cir.), writ denied, 516 So.2d 131 (La.1987).

Having reviewed the record, we find that none of the proffered evidence of subsequent accidents is similar enough to Mrs. Jones’s fall to be relevant. The plaintiffs argue that [573]*573the subsequent accidents should be admissible because they occurred at the same place, namely on the library’s terrazzo floor, and under the same conditions, days that were raining, as did Mrs. Jones’s fall. However, in all three of the proffered accidents, the victims slipped on the terrazzo floor, as evidenced by the fact that in each incident the person’s feet came out from underneath them. For example, the plaintiffs proffered evidence of a fall suffered by Patricia Martin. According to the accident report filed for Ms. Martin, she slipped |6on the wet floor and fell. A witness to the fall stated that Ms. Martin’s legs went out from under her.

Mrs. Jones, on the other hand, testified that she fell face forward and that she did not know why she had fallen. As discussed previously, the record supports the trial court’s conclusion that Mrs. Jones tripped, rather than slipped. Thus, the subsequent accidents offered by the plaintiffs, in which the victims slipped on the floor, were not caused by the same or a similar defect as that encountered by Mrs. Jones, who tripped. Accordingly, the trial court was correct in excluding the evidence of the subsequent accidents.

In their third assignment of error the plaintiffs contend that the trial court erred in excluding evidence of subsequent remedial measures taken by the defendant. The plaintiffs sought to introduce evidence that, sometime after Mrs.

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Bluebook (online)
665 So. 2d 570, 95 La.App. 5 Cir. 659, 1995 La. App. LEXIS 3390, 1995 WL 697946, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/jones-v-parish-of-jefferson-lactapp-1995.