Title: Glover v. City of Mobile

State: alabama

Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court

Document:

417 So. 2d 175 (1982)
Leon GLOVER, etc.
v.
CITY OF MOBILE, etc.
81-183.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
July 23, 1982.
*176 George J. Moore of Moore & Layden, Mobile, for appellants.
Thomas M. Galloway, Jr., of Collins, Galloway & Smith, Mobile, for appellees.
PER CURIAM.
Plaintiff Leon Glover, as Administrator, brought an action against Defendant City of Mobile for the wrongful death of his two minor sons. Plaintiff now appeals from a summary judgment for Defendant and the denial of his motion to reconsider.
We affirm.
Luscher Park, a recreational facility of the City of Mobile, borders on and is a part of the shoreline of the Dog River. Along a portion of the shoreline, the City built a pier, bulkheads, and a pavilion containing a food concession and a public restroom facility. The park is open to the public and no admission fee is charged. In an affidavit in support of the City's motion for summary judgment, the Mobile Parks Superintendent stated that the City "has never operated a swimming facility at Luscher Park."
Glover contends, however, that whirlpools in the water in front of the pavilion create a dangerous situation for those who do swim in the river, and that the City knew or should have known of the danger to the general public. Glover's two minor sons drowned in the Dog River while visiting Luscher Park in June of 1978.
Plaintiff alleges both negligent performance and wanton breach of the City's implied contract with the general public to take reasonable steps for water safety at the park and that both decedents were third party beneficiaries of that implied contract; that Luscher Park was an attractive nuisance because of the accessibility and alluring nature of the water; and that the City could have undertaken reasonable and feasible ways to remove or lessen the dangers posed by the deep water and whirlpools. Plaintiff also maintains that the provisions of Code 1975, § 35-15-1 et seq., are both unconstitutional and inapplicable to the instant case.
We note that § 35-15-1 et seq., enacted by the Legislature in 1965 as Act 463, was passed:
Although the question of the applicability of § 35-15-1, et seq., to a municipality/landowner has not been addressed by this Court, we find that any discussion of that issue here would merely be an exercise in academics. The established rules of premises liability sufficiently resolve the pivotal question here of the City's duty to Plaintiff's sons because:
Sheffield Co. v. Morton, 161 Ala. 153, 161, 49 So. 772 (1909).
The common law principle to which the Legislature referred in its statement of purpose for the adoption of Act 463 was well-stated in W. S. Fowler Rental Equipment Co. v. Skipper, 276 Ala. 593, 165 So. 2d 375 (1963):
W. S. Fowler, at 276 Ala. 600, 165 So. 2d 375.
Both the statute and the Fowler decision were considered and approved in Wright v. Alabama Power Company, 355 So. 2d 322 (Ala.1978), wherein this Court held:
Wright v. Alabama Power Company, at 355 So. 2d 325.
We find no allegation by Plaintiff that the City did some positive act creating a new hidden danger, unavoidable through the use of reasonable care and skill. On the contrary, rather than avoiding the waters of the Dog River, Plaintiff's sons intentionally subjected themselves to possible dangers there by entering the water to swim. Further, in light of the City's policy of "no swimming" at Luscher Park, we find no evidence that the City maliciously, willfully or intentionally failed to warn against a potentially dangerous condition.
As to the possibility of the whirlpools' constituting an unreasonably dangerous condition, we note this Court's further language in Wright, supra:
Wright, at 355 So. 2d 325, 326.
While the whirlpools are certainly not "objects" or "bodies," as was the fence in Wright, the definition, as found in the Green decision, uses the word "condition." The "condition" of the whirlpools in the Dog River, then, was not created by the City's act of developing Luscher Park nor can it be classified as a trap or pitfall. Further, by simply recognizing and abiding by the City's intended uses of Luscher Park, the dangerous propensities of the water can reasonably be avoided.
Because the City owed no further duty to Plaintiff's sons than that set out in Wright, supra, and because the City has not breached that duty, we find that summary judgment as to the City's alleged negligence or wanton breach of an implied contract with Plaintiff's sons was entirely proper.
Similarly, summary judgment as to the count of attractive nuisance was properly entered by the trial court. In Bailey v. City of Mobile, 292 Ala. 436, 296 So. 2d 149 (1974), this Court considered an action against the City for the drowning deaths of two children in a deep drainage ditch. The Court denied liability and held:
Bailey, at 292 Ala. 439.
We hold, then, that the trial court was correct in entering summary judgment for Defendant City of Mobile and in denying Plaintiff's motion to reconsider. That judgment is due to be, and is hereby, affirmed.
AFFIRMED.
TORBERT, C. J., and FAULKNER, ALMON, SHORES, EMBRY, BEATTY and ADAMS, JJ., concur.
JONES, J., dissents.
JONES, Justice (dissenting).
I respectfully dissent.
Applying § 35-15-1 to the City's operation of a public park, the majority has extended the equation of the minimum duty owed by landowners to trespassers and licensees to invitees. While most states have advanced their jurisprudence to abolish the distinction between the status of invitees and licensees, this Court has today taken a backward step; and, instead of advancing the status of the occupier of another's premises, it has lowered the status of an invitee to that of a licensee and a trespasser. (Indeed, the Restatement, cited infra, would impose liability upon the landowner even as to a licensee under the instant circumstances.)
I cannot read § 35-15-1 as expressing a legislative intent to lower the standard of care owed by a city to users of public lands. With large tracts of land suitable for hunting, fishing, etc., becoming vested in fewer and fewer private owners, § 35-15-1 finds its beneficient purpose in protecting such owners from the traditional invitee standard of care in order that more property will be made available for outdoor sports. The statute accomplishes this purpose by "clarify[ing] ... the common law" with respect to licensees; and, then, in effect, classifying one who may be upon the premises for such purposes, not "connected with the landowner's business," as a licensee.
The statutory scheme espoused in § 35-15-1 simply does not embrace the user of a municipal park. Such property is, by its very nature, public land; and those who use it were not intended by the statute to be reduced to the status of a licensee. One who uses a public park is an invitee; and I do not believe § 35-15-1 alters the common law degree of duty on the part of the city toward an authorized userthat duty being one of due care. To hold otherwiseas the majority doesis to hold that the city owes the duty of reasonable care in its construction and maintenance of city streets but only the duty not to wilfully or maliciously injure one who uses its public parks. Above all else, the law ought to make sense. The application of § 35-15-1 to a city park, in my opinion, does not make sense. See Restatement (Second) of Torts, § 342, Dangerous Conditions Known to Possessor (1974).