Title: Shank v. Peabody Cooperative Equity Exchange
Citation: 186 Kan. 648, 352 P.2d 41
Docket Number: 41,801
State: Kansas
Issuer: Kansas Supreme Court
Date: May 14, 1960

186 Kan. 648 (1960)
352 P.2d 41
Ernest Shank, Surviving Father and next of kin of Alex Joe Shank (Revived in the name of JOSEPH E. BROCK, Administrator of the Estate of Ernest Shank, Deceased), Appellant,
v.
THE PEABODY COOPERATIVE EQUITY EXCHANGE, a Corporation, Appellee.
No. 41,801

Supreme Court of Kansas.
Opinion filed May 14, 1960.
Enos E. Hook, of Wichita, argued the cause, and Sidney L. Foulston; John H. Gerety; and Sidney L. Foulston, Jr., all of Wichita, were with him on the briefs for the appellant.
John F. Hayes, of Hutchinson, argued the cause, and Robert J. Gilliland; and C.W. Miller, both of Hutchinson, and David W. Wheeler; and Edwin G. Westerhaus, both of Marion, were with him on the briefs for the appellee.
The opinion of the court was delivered by
PARKER, C.J.:
Ernest Shank of Peabody brought this action for damages for the wrongful death of his minor son against the Peabody Cooperative Equity Exchange, a Corporation, doing business in that city, and perfected an appeal to this court from an order and judgment of the district court of Marion County sustaining a demurrer to his amended petition.
Sometime after perfecting his appeal Ernest died intestate. Thereafter this action was revived in the name of Joseph E. Brock, as the administrator of such decedent's estate, and later, on proper application, *649 such fiduciary was substituted as appellant for purposes of proceeding with the appeal in this court.
The facts, which for purposes of testing the ruling on the demurrer must be accepted as true, appear in the amended petition. Omitting formal averments, surplus language and the prayer, pertinent portions of that pleading read:
..............
Following the filing of the foregoing petition the defendant demurred thereto on the ground it did not state facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action in that the matters and allegations therein contained conclusively showed the decedent, Alex Joe Shank, was at all times material a trespasser, was of sufficient age and capacity to be not free from fault and was guilty of negligence which proximately caused or contributed to his death thereby barring plaintiff of any recovery.
After a hearing the trial court sustained the foregoing demurrer and this appeal followed.
In approaching questions raised by the parties in connection with the propriety of the ruling on the demurrer time and space will be saved by a brief reference to divers matters.
As against a demurrer all well pleaded allegations of the amended petition, hereinafter referred to as the petition, must be accepted as true and appellant is entitled not only to the benefit of all facts thus pleaded but to all reasonable inferences that may be drawn therefrom (Galleher v. City of Wichita, 179 Kan. 513, 522, 523, 296 P.2d 1062).
This is what is known as an attractive nuisance case.
Historically, the attractive nuisance doctrine was recognized as a part of the law of this state in what was then known as the turntable cases, the first being Kansas Cent. Ry. Co. v. Fitzsimmons, 22 Kan. 636. For an outstanding discussion of the cases on which the doctrine was founded, as well as its application, see Moseley v. City of Kansas City, 170 Kan. 585, 588 to 590, incl., 228 P.2d 699. Later such doctrine was expanded to other objects and situations and is now generally known as that of an attractive nuisance. For *652 a discussion of the over-all subject, wherein both our early and more recent decisions are considered, discussed and construed, see pages 519 to 522, incl., of the opinion in the Galleher case.
In Moseley v. City of Kansas City, supra, we said:
And in Galleher v. City of Wichita, supra, following prior decisions, we held:
The principle involved in attractive nuisance cases is the same as that upon which the earlier "turntable cases" were resolved, in which it was held, with few exceptions, that the maintenance, in an unguarded manner, of a dangerous apparatus for the shifting of locomotives, attractive to children residing or accustomed to playing nearby, constituted negligence upon the part of companies operating turntables. (Price v. Water Co., 58 Kan. 551, 555, 50 Pac. 450.)
It is not feasible to here write a thesis on the attractive nuisance doctrine and we shall not attempt to do so. However, much has been written on the subject and it should be pointed out that those interested in exploring it will find numerous decisions, dealing therewith, cited in the Moseley and Galleher cases; in decisions to which we shall presently refer; in cases from this jurisdiction listed in West's Kansas Digest, Negligence, § 23, and in Hatcher's Kansas Digest [Rev. Ed.], Negligence, §§ 20 to 23, incl.; also excellent discussions under the subject of negligence in 45 C.J. §§ 155 to 189; 65 C.J.S. § 29; 38 Am. Jur., §§ 142 to 157. See also, cases collected in annotations, 36 A.L.R. 34; 39 A.L.R. 486; 53 A.L.R. 1546; and 60 A.L.R. 1444.
*653 Nor do we believe that it is necessary or required that we repeat the comprehensive allegations of the petition which, since they were quoted at length for that purpose early in this opinion, we may assume our readers have a full and complete understanding. It suffices to say that after careful analysis of all such allegations, mindful that for present purposes we are not concerned with what the proof may show concerning them on a trial of the cause, we find several cases, substantially similar from the standpoint of facts and circumstances involved, which, when such allegations are accepted as true and given the benefit of inferences to which they are entitled for purposes of testing the propriety of the ruling now under consideration, convince us the trial court erred in sustaining the demurrer to the petition.
The first and perhaps the most important of the cases to which we have just referred, particularly since it was here on appeal from an order sustaining a general demurrer to a petition based on liability under the attractive nuisance doctrine, is Biggs v. Wire Co., 60 Kan. 217, 56 Pac. 4. There liability was predicated on the maintenance of dangerous machinery on private grounds. Here liability is based on the maintenance, under the conditions and circumstances set forth in the petition, of an unguarded metal warehouse which, with the knowledge and acquiescence of the appellee, was regularly, habitually and commonly used by the children of Peabody, and more particularly Alex Joe Shank, who was eleven years of age, as an attraction and a place to play on and in and about. In reversing the trial court's action sustaining the demurrer this court, on allegations of a petition far less comprehensive than the one in the case at bar held:
The next is Price v. Water Co., supra, which was here on appeal from an order sustaining a demurrer to the plaintiff's evidence. So far as the record shows the petition was not challenged and the case went to trial on issues joined by the pleadings, including a petition containing allegations quite similar to those here involved. In that *654 case it is interesting to note we rejected a contention the defendant owed the deceased boy no duty to guard against the accident which occurred because he was a trespasser on its premises; and in reversing the order and judgment sustaining the demurrer held:
And in the opinion said:
Another case is Kansas Cent. Ry. Co. v. Fitzsimmons, supra, heretofore referred to as the first of the turntable cases. This case was tried by a jury which returned a verdict in favor of the plaintiff and judgment was rendered accordingly. In affirming the judgment we held:
See, also, Kinchlow v. Elevator Co., 57 Kan. 374, 46 Pac. 703, an attractive nuisance case, involving a ten-year-old boy who fell into a barrel partly full of hot water located close to an elevator. In that case, in reversing the trial court's action in sustaining a demurrer to plaintiff's evidence, we held:
*655 Still another, and more recent decision, is Talbott v. Farmers Union Co-op Elevator, 174 Kan. 435, 256 P.2d 856. The action was brought by the parents of an eight-year-old boy to recover damages for his wrongful death, allegedly caused by the defendant elevator company and its manager in negligently maintaining an attractive nuisance in the form of an insecurely and defectively covered abandoned well on the elevator premises. Defendants' demurrers to the petition and the amended petition, based on grounds both pleadings failed to state a cause of action under the attractive nuisance doctrine, were overruled and we affirmed the trial court's ruling. Without laboring the opinion in that case it may be stated from what is there said and held we are convinced it supports the decisions last above cited and our previously indicated view as to the propriety of the ruling on the demurrer in the instant case.
When the facts, conditions and circumstances alleged in the petition are carefully reviewed, in the light of the foregoing decisions and what has been heretofore stated and held, we are impelled to conclude, contrary to appellee's contentions on the two questions it concedes are involved on appeal, that it may not be held as a matter of law (1) that the metal warehouse in question was not maintained in such a manner as to constitute an attractive nuisance or (2) that the decedent, Alex Joe Shank, was of such age that his actions constituted those of a trespasser, thereby barring the doctrine of attractive nuisance and making such decedent guilty of negligence which proximately caused and contributed to his death. Stated in different form, accepting the allegations of the petition as true and assuming appellant will be able to assume the burden of proving them as pleaded, we are convinced that pleading contains allegations sufficient to require consideration of the foregoing questions by the trier of facts.
In conclusion it should be stated we have not overlooked but carefully examined decisions from this jurisdiction, cited by appellee in support of its position the demurrer was properly sustained. In our opinion such decisions are clearly distinguishable. To illustrate:
Moseley v. City of Kansas City, supra, the only Kansas case cited by appellee in which a ruling on a demurrer to a petition is involved, points out the petition in that case does not allege the defendants knew, or should have known, children had played about the place in question. Moreover, the law of the case, as stated in the syllabus, holds the doctrine of attractive nuisance is not applicable to a boy *656 of sixteen years. In the case at bar the petition contains allegations of knowledge and acquiescence by appellee of use on the part of children generally; and the boy involved was only eleven years of age at the time of the accident.
Talbott v. Farmers Union Co-op Elevator, supra, and Galleher v. City of Wichita, supra, have been heretofore discussed and construed as upholding appellant's position as to the sufficiency of the petition.
In Brennan v. Kaw Construction Co., 176 Kan. 465, 271 P.2d 253, the appeal was from an order sustaining a demurrer to evidence, not the petition, which we affirmed. The question involved was whether there was sufficient proof of the existence of an attractive nuisance. Moreover, in deciding the case we held that the rule as to liability of the defendants depended on whether the danger involved was latent or patent and that the proof established it was patent, hence the ruling was proper. Here the danger from liquid cyanide gas must be admitted to have been a latent danger.
In Anderson v. Kansas City Public Service Co., 127 Kan. 375, 273 Pac. 397, the court decided that a demurrer should have been sustained to the evidence. However, it is to be noted the boy there involved was thirteen years old, the plaintiff sought recovery on the theory that a public viaduct, together with utility transmission lines, constituted an attractive nuisance, and that we held that under the evidence, the electric wires could hardly have been put in a place more difficult of access to the injured plaintiff.
Pennington v. Oil &amp; Gas Co., 106 Kan. 569, 189 Pac. 137, is a case where the plaintiffs, father and mother of a nine-year-old son, brought an action against the defendant for its alleged negligence in causing the child's death. The trial court sustained a demurrer to the plaintiffs' evidence, gave judgment for the defendant, and on appeal from that ruling we affirmed the judgment. Attention is directed to the fact that, in that case, the machinery alleged to have caused the death of the son was enclosed and not left unguarded. Moreover, the plaintiff father, himself, had been employed by the defendant to run and guard its pumping plant and had been in that position for a considerable period of time before the accident.
The order and judgment of the trial court in sustaining the demurrer to the petition is reversed.
It is so ordered.