Title: Frazee v. St. Louis-San Francisco Rly. Co.
Citation: 219 Kan. 661, 549 P.2d 561
Docket Number: 47,964
State: Kansas
Issuer: Kansas Supreme Court
Date: May 8, 1976

219 Kan. 661 (1976)
549 P.2d 561
DAVID FRAZEE, INDIVIDUALLY AND AS FATHER AND NEXT FRIEND OF RANDAL FRAZEE, A MINOR, Appellant,
v.
ST. LOUIS-SAN FRANCISCO RAILWAY COMPANY, A CORPORATION, Appellee.
No. 47,964

Supreme Court of Kansas.
Opinion filed May 8, 1976.
John C. Frank, of Wichita, argued the cause, and Raymond W. Baker, of Wichita, was with him on the brief for the appellant.
J. Michael Peters, of Gott, Hope, Gott, Young &amp; Saffels, P.A., of Wichita, argued the cause, and Glenn D. Young, Jr., of the same firm, was with him on the brief for the appellee.
M. Ralph Baehr, of Wichita, was on the brief amicus curiae, for The Kansas Trial Lawyers Association.
The opinion of the court was delivered by
SCHROEDER, J.:
This is a damage action wherein David Frazee (plaintiff-appellant) seeks to recover for injuries sustained by his minor son, Randal Frazee, when Randal attempted to board a moving freight car on the railroad tracks of the St. Louis-San Francisco Railway Company (defendant-appellee). Upon stipulated facts the trial court found Randal to be a trespasser and sustained the defendant's motion for summary judgment.
The primary thrust on appeal is an attempt to persuade this court to overrule its prior decisions and replace the premises doctrine, *662 which is based upon the status of an injured party on the premises of another, with the imposition of a single duty of reasonable care under the particular circumstances.
This action was commenced October 22, 1974, when the plaintiff filed his petition in the District Court of Sedgwick County, Kansas. The petition alleged the plaintiff had incurred medical and hospital expenses and that his minor son, Randal Frazee, had sustained severe permanent injuries as the result of the negligence of the defendant. On November 22, 1974, defendant filed its answer denying plaintiff's allegation of negligence and asserting that plaintiff and/or Randal Frazee were contributorily negligent. Defendant further asserted that Randal Frazee was a trespasser on its property at the time he was injured.
On May 17, 1975, defendant filed its motion for summary judgment, together with stipulations of fact signed by the attorneys for the parties. The facts stipulated by the parties were as follows:
At the hearing on the motion, March 27, 1975, the plaintiff offered into evidence pictures, accompanied by affidavits, generally depicting the area surrounding the defendant's tracks and depicting the path, footbridge and garden described in the stipulations. Upon objection by the defendant the trial court held the pictures inadmissible on the ground they were not relevant. This point, assigned as error by the appellant, has no merit. The pictures, made a part of the record on appeal, add nothing of legal significance to the stipulations.
In arguing the motion for summary judgment the plaintiff contended Randal, at the time he attempted to board the railroad car of the defendant, was a licensee rather than a trespasser. The defendant contended Randal was a trespasser.
The trial court made findings of fact in accordance with the stipulations, and found Randal to be a trespasser and not a licensee at the time he attempted to board the defendant's railroad car. It concluded under Kansas law the defendant owed Randal no duty other than to refrain from willfully, wantonly and recklessly injuring him, and upon the stipulations the defendant was entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Appeal has been duly perfected.
The appellant contends the trial court erred in finding Randal to be a trespasser.
In the law of negligence a trespasser is a person who enters on the property of another without any right, lawful authority or an *664 express or implied invitation or license. (Morris v. Atchison, T. &amp; S.F. Rly. Co., 198 Kan. 147, 154, 422 P.2d 920, and 65 C.J.S., Negligence, § 63 (3) a, p. 659.)
The Restatement of the Law, Second, Torts, § 329, is in general accord. It states:
Here the facts show Randal Frazee was injured at a point 250 feet west of both the footbridge across the canal and the Frazee's family garden. Furthermore, the point of injury was 69 feet east of the curb line of "C" Street. Thus when Randal was injured it could not be said he was near either the footbridge or the family garden plot. It is admitted Randal was not seen on the day in question by the train crew, thus he does not fall into the classification of a known trespasser. There is no allegation Randal was a frequent or constant trespasser of the railroad's right-of-way.
In Morris v. Railway Co., 103 Kan. 220, 173 Pac. 346, a two-year-old boy was struck when he was at a point 150 feet south of a much used public highway. The court treated the child as a trespasser saying:
The appellant's attempt to embellish upon the facts in his brief is without avail to him on this appeal in view of the stipulations of fact.
That Randal was nine years old at the time of the accident does not alter his status as a trespasser. The general rule in this area long recognized by our courts is that infants have no greater right to trespass upon other people's land than adults. The same rules apply even though the trespasser might be an infant. (Lemon v. Busey, 204 Kan. 119, 126, 461 P.2d 145; Roberts v. Beebe, 200 Kan. 119, 124, 434 P.2d 789; and United Zinc Co. v. Britt, 258 U.S. 268, 66 L. Ed. 615, 42 S. Ct. 299, 36 A.L.R. 28.)
In Morris v. Railway Co., supra, the court said:
*665 After carefully reviewing the stipulated facts and the cases to which the court has been cited, we are convinced the trial court did not err in finding Randal Frazee was a trespasser at the time and place he attempted to board the appellee's railroad car.
It has long been the rule in Kansas that the only duty owed by a landowner to a trespasser is to refrain from willfully, wantonly or recklessly injuring him. As early as 1882, this court held that a railway company has the exclusive right to occupy its tracks, and any person walking upon a track or bridge without the consent of the company is a trespasser and is without remedy unless it is proved by affirmative evidence that the injuries resulted from negligence so gross as to amount to wantonness. (Mason v. Mo. Pac. Rly. Co., 27 Kan. 83, 41 A.R. 405.)
In A.T. &amp; S.F. Rld. Co. v. Todd, 54 Kan. 551, 38 Pac. 804, this court, in a case involving the death of a nine-year-old boy, held that the only duty which the railroad company owed to one who was not rightfully upon its premises, whether an infant or an adult, was not to willfully or wantonly injure him; but such duty would not arise until it had discovered the whereabouts and the perilous situation of the trespasser.
In Wilson v. Railway Co., 66 Kan. 183, 71 Pac. 282, the court was concerned with a twelve-year-old boy who jumped on and off a railroad car and was injured, and the general rule was asserted that the only duty to such a trespasser was not to willfully, wantonly or recklessly injure him. The rule has been applied uniformly in cases of this nature from the early history of this state up to the present cases. (Handley v. Railway Co., 61 Kan. 237, 59 Pac. 271; Mendenhall v. Railway Co., 66 Kan. 438, 71 Pac. 846, 97 A.S. 380, 61 L.R.A. 120; Richardson v. Railway Co., 90 Kan. 292, 133 Pac. 535; Garcia v. Railway Co., 100 Kan. 259, 164 Pac. 272; Carson v. Railway Co., 103 Kan. 138, 172 Pac. 1000; and Morris v. Atchison, T. &amp; S.F. Rly. Co., supra.)
The appellant has stated the railroad's right-of-way was not fenced. The duty owed to a trespasser does not include a duty to take security measures to prevent trespassing. A railroad company does not have a duty to fence its property to prevent trespassing children from boarding its moving trains. (Briney v. Illinois Cent. R. Co., 324 Ill. App. 375, 58 N.E.2d 286 [1944]; Nolley v. Chicago, M., St. P. &amp; P.R. Co., 183 F.2d 566 [8th Cir.1950], cert. denied, 340 U.S. 913, 95 L. Ed. 660, 71 S. Ct. 284; Nixon v. Montana Etc. Ry. Co. et al., 50 Mont. 95, 145 Pac. 8 [1914]; and Annot., 35 A.L.R.3d 9, § 4[a] [1971].)
*666 Courts have repeatedly recognized that there is ordinarily no duty on the railroad company to police its tracks and trains to prevent trespassing children from boarding its trains. (Louisville &amp; Nashville Railroad Co. v. Spence's Adm'r, 282 S.W.2d 826 [Ky. Ct. App. 1955]; Nolley v. Chicago, M., St. P. &amp; P.R. Co., supra; Smith v. Illinois Central R. Co., 214 Miss. 293, 58 So. 2d 812 [1952]; Egan v. Erie R. Co., 29 N.J. 243, 148 A.2d 830 [1959]; Kline v. New York, N.H. &amp; H.R. Co., 160 Conn. 187, 276 A.2d 890 [1970]; and Annot., 35 A.L.R.3d 9, § 4[b] [1971].)
For this court to impose that kind of a duty on the railroad company would place an unreasonable burden upon the railroad. (Kline v. New York, N.H. &amp; H.R. Co., supra; and George v. Texas and New Orleans Railroad Company, 290 S.W.2d 264 [Tex. Civ. App. 1956].) In George, the Texas court said:
Our court has determined this question in Wilson v. Railway Co., supra, where it was said:
This principle was reaffirmed in Carson v. Railway Co., supra where the court held:
Contrary to the appellant's assertion that the railroad company could have easily prevented the injury to Randal Frazee, the burden of so doing would be, now as it was when Wilson was decided, an insurmountable one. Nothing short of the most pervasive and expensive security measure could ever prevent a person from running from a place of safety to the side of a railroad car and jumping on. This kind of a burden is not, and should not be, a part of the Kansas law.
Under the present Kansas law, the trial court clearly committed no error in holding that the only duty owed to Randal Frazee, as a trespasser, was the negative duty to refrain from willfully, wantonly or recklessly injuring him. The appellant herein does not contend *667 the appellee or any of its agents, servants or employees willfully, wantonly or recklessly injured Randal Frazee.
On the facts here presented the majority of the members of this court reject the appellant's invitation to overrule our prior decisions, heretofore cited and discussed, and adopt the "so called" modern rule first developed in the California case of Rowland v. Christian, 69 Cal. 2d 108, 70 Cal. Rptr. 97, 443 P.2d 561, 32 A.L.R.3d 496 (1968). (See, Mounsey v. Ellard, 363 Mass. 693, 297 N.E.2d 43 [1973]; Pickard v. City &amp; County, 51 Hawaii 134, 452 P.2d 445 [1969]; Peterson v. Balach, 294 Minn. 161, 199 N.W.2d 639 [1972]; Wood v. Camp, 284 So. 2d 691 [Fla. 1973]; Mile High Fence v. Radovich, 175 Colo. 537, 489 P.2d 308 [1971]; Smith v. Arbaugh's Restaurant, Inc., 469 F.2d 97 [D.C. Cir.1972], cert. denied, 412 U.S. 939, 37 L. Ed. 2d 399, 93 S. Ct. 2774; Mariorenzi v. Joseph DiPonte, Inc., ___ R.I. ___, 333 A.2d 127 [1975]; and Antoniewicz v. Reszczynski, 70 Wis.2d 836, 236 N.W.2d 1 [1975].)
The judgment of the lower court is affirmed.
FATZER, C.J., OWSLEY and PRAGER, JJ., dissenting.