Case Name: CLARK ATLANTA UNIVERSITY, INC. v. WILLIAMS
Court: Court of Appeals of Georgia
Jurisdiction: Georgia
Decision Date: 2007-11-01
Citations: 288 Ga. App. 180
Docket Number: A07A0870
Parties: CLARK ATLANTA UNIVERSITY, INC. v. WILLIAMS.
Judges: Smith, P. J., Phipps, Mikell and Bernes, JJ., concur. Johnson, P. J., and Blackburn, P. J., dissent.
Reporter: Georgia Appeals Reports
Volume: 288
Pages: 180–184

Head Matter:
A07A0870.
CLARK ATLANTA UNIVERSITY, INC. v. WILLIAMS.
(654 SE2d 402)

Opinion:
Ruffin, Judge.
In this premises liability action, Walter Williams sued Clark Atlanta University, Inc. ("CAU") for injuries sustained when he was shot on property allegedly owned by CAU. The university moved for summary judgment, asserting it owed no duty to Williams. The trial court denied the motion, and we granted CAU's application for interlocutory appeal. For reasons that follow, we affirm.
1. Summary judgment is appropriate when no genuine issues of material fact remain and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. On appeal, we review the trial court's summary judgment ruling de novo, construing the evidence and all reasonable inferences drawn from it in a light most favorable to the nonmovant.
So construed, the evidence shows that at the time of the shooting, Williams was a student at Morris Brown College. Like CAU, Morris Brown is part of a consortium of six colleges and universities located within a geographic area known as the Atlanta University Center ("AUC"). The consortium schools collaborate in several ways, and the students intermingle. For example, students may cross-register in undergraduate courses and programs offered by the various schools. A shuttle transports students among the respective campuses and other areas within the AUC, such as the common library. Williams and other AUC students also shared a dormitory located on Beckwith Street that was owned by the Interdenominational Theological Center, a school within the consortium.
The day of the shooting, Williams attended a workshop for graduating seniors at the student center on the CAU campus. He stayed at the workshop for several hours, then ate at the CAU student center cafeteria, remaining for approximately one additional hour. At that point, he walked through the campus toward his dormitory and down a portion of Beckwith Street known as CAU's faculty row, where CAU owns several faculty houses that it leases to faculty members and other employees. Although CAU offered testimony that faculty row is not "on [its] campus," these properties are shown and identified on a CAU campus map.
En route to his dormitory, Williams stopped in front of a CAU faculty house located across the street from his dormitory to visit with friends. The faculty house was occupied at the time by a guest professor, but CAU was paying the rent and cost of utilities for the house, and the professor had no written lease for the property. Williams sat on the faculty house lawn and socialized for approximately 45 minutes before two men appeared with guns. According to Williams, one of the men placed a gun against his chest, pushed him up the lawn toward the faculty house, and searched his pockets for money. Finding no money, the man shot Williams twice.
In moving for summary judgment, CAU focused on the duty owed to Williams. It argued that because Williams was on a public sidewalk adjacent to a public street at the time of the assault, it was not liable for his injuries. It further claimed that even if Williams was on CAU property when the shooting occurred, he was not a CAU invitee, and the university owed him no duty of ordinary care. According to CAU, therefore, it was not duty bound to protect Williams from the criminal act of a third party.
Williams testified, however, that he was seated on the front lawn of a CAU faculty house when assaulted, raising a question of fact as to whether he was on the university's property. A jury question also remains as to whether CAU owed Williams a duty of ordinary care.
Under OCGA § 51-3-1, a landowner must exercise ordinary care in keeping its premises and approaches safe for invitees. "An invitee is someone whom a landowner, by express or implied invitation, induces or leads to come upon his premises for any lawful purpose." That purpose must be mutually beneficial: "If the relationship is one of mutual interest to the parties, the injured party is an invitee of the owner." As we have previously found, the relationship between a college or university and its students is one of mutual benefit, rendering students invitees.
Although Williams was enrolled at Morris Brown, he was a student within the AUC and entered the CAU campus to attend an AUC student function. While attending that function — and while later eating at the CAU cafeteria — Williams undoubtedly was an invitee on the campus. The question, therefore, is whether he lost that status at some point before the shooting.
On appeal, CAU argues — and the dissent agrees — that Williams was no longer an invitee while visiting with friends on the faculty house lawn. At the time, however, he was on his way to his dormitory from the CAU workshop. He had departed the main "interior" campus, but was on faculty row property owned by CAU, as shown on a map of the CAU campus, and intermixed with other CAU buildings.
A jury could find that Williams had not yet left the campus at the time of the assault. And although the faculty house where the assault occurred was occupied by a guest professor, CAU was paying the rent on the property, and the evidence does not demonstrate that, as a matter of law, Williams was in an area "off limits" to students. Moreover, we cannot conclude that Williams necessarily lost his invitee status simply because he stopped to socialize for 45 minutes, a normal activity for college students.
Questions of fact remain as to whether Williams was an invitee of CAU when he was shot. Accordingly, the trial court properly denied CAU's motion for summary judgment on this basis.
2. As noted above, CAU moved for summary judgment on the issue of duty, arguing that because Williams was not an invitee at the time of the shooting, it owed him no duty of ordinary care. The university raised this same argument on appeal, again asserting that it owed no duty to protect Williams. Despite this focus, the dissent argues that the trial court's ruling should be reversed because even if a duty of ordinary care existed, Williams failed to produce evidence that CAU breached the duty.
We disagree. This Court does not apply a "wrong for any reason" rule. On the contrary, we must refrain from reversing a ruling on a ground not raised or considered below.* CAU chose to move for summary judgment only on the issue of duty. It could have challenged Williams's proof of breach, and, as the dissent suggests, such argument might have been successful. But it did not do so, and Williams was never on notice that he needed to address the issue or present evidence regarding breach at the summary judgment stage.
The dissent advocates granting summary judgment at the appellate level on an issue neither raised by the parties nor considered by the lower court. Such sua sponte action is not only fundamentally unfair, it undercuts our purpose — the correction of errors of law committed by the trial court. We cannot, and should not, resolve this case on the issue of breach; thus the judgment should be affirmed.
Judgment affirmed.
Smith, P. J., Phipps, Mikell and Bernes, JJ., concur. Johnson, P. J., and Blackburn, P. J., dissent.
Williams also sued the Atlanta University Center, Inc., which successfully moved for summary judgment below. That summary judgment ruling is not at issue in this appeal.
See Barnes v. St. Stephen's Missionary Baptist Church, 260 Ga. App. 765 (580 SE2d 587) (2003).
See id. at 766.
See id. at 767 (1) ("Georgia decisions considering the liability of property owners for criminal acts by third parties uniformly limit their discussions to the claims of invitees.").
Howard v. The Gram Corp., 268 Ga. App. 466, 467 (602 SE2d 241) (2004). See also OCGA § 51-3-1.
(Punctuation omitted.) Walker v. Daniels, 200 Ga. App. 150, 154 (1) (407 SE2d 70) (1991). See also Bishop v. Mongal Bhai Enterprises, 194 Ga. App. 874, 876 (2) (392 SE2d 535) (1990) (an invitee has " 'present business relations with the owner or occupier which would render his presence of mutual benefit to both' ").
See Walker, supra at 154-155.
See Shaw v. McDonald's Restaurants of Ga., 191 Ga. App. 583, 584 (1) (382 SE2d 632) (1989) (jury authorized to find that restaurant patron exceeded the scope of her invitation by venturing into an area of restaurant that was "off limits" to customers).
See Bishop, supra.
See Designs Unlimited v. Rodriguez, 267 Ga. App. 847, 847-848 (601 SE2d 381) (2004).
See id.
See Lowery v. Atlanta Heart Assoc., 266 Ga. App. 402, 404-405 (2) (597 SE2d 494) (2004); Designs Unlimited, supra at 847.