Mauter v. Toledo Hospital, Inc.

571 N.E.2d 470, 59 Ohio App. 3d 90, 1989 Ohio App. LEXIS 2937
CourtOhio Court of Appeals
DecidedJuly 28, 1989
DocketL-88-327
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 571 N.E.2d 470 (Mauter v. Toledo Hospital, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Ohio Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Mauter v. Toledo Hospital, Inc., 571 N.E.2d 470, 59 Ohio App. 3d 90, 1989 Ohio App. LEXIS 2937 (Ohio Ct. App. 1989).

Opinions

Abood, J.

This is an appeal from a decision of the Lucas County Court of Common Pleas granting defendant-ap-pellee Toledo Hospital, Inc.’s motion for summary judgment. Plaintiff-appellant Marilyn Mauter filed a timely notice of appeal setting forth two assignments of error:

“The trial court erred in granting the Toledo Hospital’s motion for summary judgment as the evidence presented clearly indicated that genuine issues of material fact exist as to whether or not Toledo Hospital exercised reasonable care in handling this incident based on the knowledge within its possession.

“The trial court erred in granting appellee’s motion for summary judgment as physical harm to its business invitees was foreseeable.”

The undisputed facts giving rise to this appeal are as follows. On the afternoon of May 23, 1985, at approximately 4:00 p.m., Scott Knapp, a security officer on duty in the south parking garage at Toledo Hospital, watched Mike Andrews walk down the “2 to 1” ramp, jump over a wall, falling as he landed, and approach the cashier’s booth where Knapp was standing. As he approached Knapp, Andrews was saying, “I can’t believe I done it but I’ve done it.” When Knapp asked him *91 what he had done, Andrews replied that he had lost his car and that he was “half fucked-up.” Knapp told Andrews to stay where he was and he would assist him and then Andrews reached out and shook Knapp’s hand introducing himself as Mike. At that point, however, Knapp was directed from the control center by another security officer, Steven Rohrs, to assist with an unruly patient in the psychiatric unit of the hospital. Knapp radioed the control center that he was with an intoxicated individual who was lost and could not find his car. The supervising security officer, Jonathan Jones, instructed Rohrs to watch Andrews on the camera monitors from the control center while Knapp assisted in the psychiatric unit. Knapp cautioned Andrews not to drive and proceeded to the psychiatric unit. As Knapp left he saw Andrews walk away from the cashier’s booth after which Rohrs was unable to locate him on the monitors. At about 4:10 p.m. Rohrs heard what sounded like a car backfiring in the garage. Soon after it was discovered that Andrews had fatally shot Brenda Andrews, his estranged wife, while she was in the parking garage after leaving a nursing seminar that had been conducted by appellee. Andrews was arrested and subsequently convicted of aggravated murder.

On February 27, 1987, appellant, as a representative of the estate of Brenda Andrews and her surviving heirs, filed a complaint for wrongful death alleging that appellee owed a duty of reasonable care to Brenda Andrews, that appellee knew or should have known that there was an intoxicated man wandering through the garage in an unstable condition and that appellee was negligent in failing to immediately remove or secure him or take proper action to secure or warn its business invitees. On April 29,1987, appellee filed its answer. On May 22, 1987, appellant amended her complaint to add additional party defendants and on September 17, 1987, ap-pellee filed its answer to the amended complaint. Discovery was conducted and on January 20,1988, appellee filed its motion for summary judgment and memorandum in support asserting that the evidence showed that no like incident had ever occurred in the parking garage, that appellee had no reason to know that Andrews was going to commit murder or any other violent act, that Andrews’ encounter with Knapp was friendly, that Andrews showed no violent tendencies, that no weapon was seen, that the violence that occurred could not have been foreseen and that consequently it owed no duty to the decedent. Appellee also argued that Brenda Andrews’ murder was not proximately caused by any alleged negligence on its part since the criminal shooting broke the chain of causation as a matter of law. On May 2, 1988, appellant filed its memorandum in opposition to ap-pellee’s motion for summary judgment asserting that appellee owed a duty of reasonable care to the decedent as a business invitee. Appellant argued that appellee knew that Andrews was intoxicated and wandering the parking garage but yet did nothing to assist, detain, or remove him and that from this evidence alone reasonable minds could conclude that it was foreseeable that harm could result to other invitees. Appellant argued further that appellee need not have known that Andrews was going to commit murder but that it was sufficient that appellee knew that some harm could result from Andrews, being there in that condition. Appellant asserted that a genuine issue of material fact clearly existed as to whether or not appellee exercised reasonable care when it did not detain, secure, or remove Andrews and whether or not that failure to act constituted negligence which contributed to Brenda Andrews’ death. *92 On May 10, 1988, appellee filed its reply memorandum and on July 12,1988, appellee filed a supplemental memorandum in support of its motion for summary judgment. On June 1, 1988, appellant filed a supplement to her memorandum in opposition.

On August 8, 1988, the trial court in its opinion and judgment entry found as follows:

“* * * [T]here is no evidence that the hospital should reasonably have known that Andrews had been threatening his wife, that Andrews carried a firearm into the parking garage, or that Andrews intended to hurt the decedent. In its answers to plaintiff's interrogatories, the hospital stated that there had never been a shooting in the parking garage or on the property of the hospital prior to this incident. Thus, the shooting of the decedent was unanticipated, and could not reasonably have been foreseen by the hospital. Therefore, the hospital had no duty to protect the decedent against this unforeseeable danger and its motion for summary judgment is found well-taken.”

It is from this decision that appellant has brought this appeal.

This court will discuss appellant’s two assignments of error together since both raise the same basic question of what duty was owed by appellee to Brenda Andrews.

In order to maintain an action for damages based on negligence, a business invitee must show that a duty was owed, that the duty was breached and that the breach was the proximate cause of the injury. Bennison v. Stillpass Transit Co. (1966), 5 Ohio St. 2d 122, 34 O.O. 2d 254, 214 N.E. 2d 213. It is undisputed that the decedent in this case was a business invitee on appellee’s premises. The Supreme Court of Ohio addressed the issue of owner/occupier liability to an invitee for the criminal acts of third parties in Howard v. Rogers (1969), 19 Ohio St. 2d 42, 48 O.O. 2d 52, 249 N.E. 2d 804. In Howard, the plaintiff was injured when a fight broke out between others at a dance she was attending, and she brought suit against the occupiers of the building where the dance was held. The status of the plaintiff was determined by the court to be that of a business invitee and upon considering the nature of the duly owed to the plaintiff in such circumstances the Howard court held in paragraphs one, two and three of the syllabus:

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
571 N.E.2d 470, 59 Ohio App. 3d 90, 1989 Ohio App. LEXIS 2937, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/mauter-v-toledo-hospital-inc-ohioctapp-1989.