Case Name: Mrs. Ellove JOHNSON et al. v. The INSURANCE COMPANY OF NORTH AMERICA and Schwegmann Brothers Giant Super Markets, Inc.
Court: Louisiana Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Louisiana
Decision Date: 1978-06-19
Citations: 360 So. 2d 818
Docket Number: No. 61179
Parties: Mrs. Ellove JOHNSON et al. v. The INSURANCE COMPANY OF NORTH AMERICA and Schwegmann Brothers Giant Super Markets, Inc.
Judges: SANDERS, C. J., concurs.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 360
Pages: 818–822

Head Matter:
Mrs. Ellove JOHNSON et al. v. The INSURANCE COMPANY OF NORTH AMERICA and Schwegmann Brothers Giant Super Markets, Inc.
No. 61179.
Supreme Court of Louisiana.
June 19, 1978.
Rehearing Denied July 26, 1978.
Melvin J. Giepert, Arnold & Giepert, New Orleans, for plaintiffs-respondents.
Madison C. Moseley, Beard, Blue, Schmitt, Mathes, Koch & Williams, New Orleans, for defendants-applicants.

Opinion:
CALOGERO, Justice.
Plaintiff Mrs. Johnson was injured while a customer in a Schwegmann's supermarket. Cans of merchandise fell from a display shelf and struck her left leg and foot. She and her husband were awarded $2,480 for her personal injuries and medical expenses against the supermarket and its insurer. The Court of Appeal affirmed, 351 So.2d 190 (La.1977), one judge dissenting.
We granted certiorari, 353 So.2d 1038 (La.1978) because we felt that the Court of Appeal unjustifiably extended the principles enunciated in Gonzales v. Winn-Dixie Louisiana Inc., 326 So.2d 486 (La.1976) and Kavlich v. Kramer, 315 So.2d 282 (La.1975).
When a customer in a self-service store proves injury resulting from a premise hazard, the burden shifts to the store operator to exculpate himself from the presumption of fault thereby arising and to establish his own freedom from fault. Gonzales v. Winn-Dixie Louisiana Inc., supra; Kavlich v. Kramer, supra. As these cases and the jurisprudence they cite illustrate, a premise hazard is a condition of the premises or of the store operation that results in an unreasonable risk of harm to customers under the circumstances. See Restatement of Torts 2d, Sections 282, 289, and 291.
The issue in this ease is whether such a premise hazard was preponderantly proved by the evidence.
Mrs. Johnson was shopping at Schwegmann's Westbank store. As she reached toward an upper shelf to get a small can of juice, three large cans of fruit juice fell from a bottom shelf, two of which struck her leg and caused her present injuries. The incident occurred at a section of the supermarket where canned juices were displayed on open shelving in three tiers. The cans had been removed from boxes and stacked on top of each other on the shelves. Mrs. Johnson testified that she did not notice before the accident how the cans were stacked, but after the accident she did notice that the cans were in disarray. Her husband testified that he was waiting in the parking lot for his wife and did not enter the store until after the accident had occurred. The security guard for the store testified that Mrs. Johnson told him after the accident that when she was reaching up for the orange juice the bottom portion of her leg touched the shelf the can fell from, but at trial Mrs. Johnson denied making this statement. The store manager and security guard described in detail store policy concerning methods and procedures used to insure that the floor was free of debris and the cans stacked properly on the shelves. The plaintiffs introduced a series of pictures taken on the juice aisle of the supermarket approximately one year after Mrs. Johnson's accident which show some of the juice cans stacked so as to slightly protrude over the edge of the shelf. While there was some testimony to the effect that if cans were badly stacked they would create a dangerous condition, and the store operator admitted that customers did occasionally move cans from shelf to shelf, there was absolutely no testimony that before the accident in question the juice cans were in disarray or protruding over the shelf edge. The fact that after the accident the cans were disarranged, with three cans on the floor, does not constitute evidence that the cans were in that condition before the accident. Nor do the pictures taken a year after the accident prove that the cans were protruding a year before.
Our opinions in Kavlich and Gonzales shift the burden of proof to a store operator after a plaintiff has shown that a premise hazard caused his injury. Once the premise hazard and the injury it caused are proved by a preponderance of the evidence, the burden of proof shifts to the store owner to show that he was not negligent. But that shifting does not occur until the plaintiff preponderantly proves a premise hazard.
We find that the evidence in this case does not preponderantly (i. e., more probably than not) show that the fruit juice cans were stacked in a dangerous manner before the accident in question. While the evidence does include some evidence that cans had been stacked unsafely in the store at various times, there is no evidence that the juice cans were improperly stacked on or before this accident, and certainly there was no preponderance to that effect. This being the case, the plaintiff has failed to carry her burden of proving a premise hazard and for that reason we conclude that the courts below erred in allowing her recovery.
Decree
Accordingly, the judgments of the district court and the Court of Appeal are reversed. Plaintiff's petition is dismissed with prejudice at her cost.
REVERSED AND RENDERED.
SANDERS, C. J., concurs.
TATE, J., dissents and assigns reasons.
DIXON, J., dissents.
DENNIS, J., dissents for reasons assigned by TATE, J.
. Because the guard's testimony was disputed by the plaintiff and apparently not accepted by the trial judge (who ruled for plaintiff) we do not rely on the guard's testimony as to what he was told by Mrs. Johnson. In any case, neither version of the story resolves to the central issue in the case: whether or not the cans were stacked incorrectly and dangerously prior to or at the time of the accident.