Opinion ID: 1598571
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: architect

Text: The District Court affirmed the dismissal, with prejudice, of the complaint against the architect because, the contract establishing his relationship with the project was not attached to the complaint. But, it is apparent that he would be entitled to the benefits of the decision in Allen v. Employers Service Corporation, Fla. App. 1971, 243 So.2d 454. Contrary to the views of the District Court, however, it is not so apparent that the architect is entitled to the benefit of said decision. In Allen v. Employers Service Corporation, [10] the District Court of Appeal, Second District, held that a service company, which had agreed to furnish the employer with inspection and advisory services relating to the safety of its employees, was immune from being sued as a third-party tort-feasor by an injured employee covered under the workmen's compensation program. Thus, because the service company had contracted with and agreed to work for the employer, the service company came under the employer's umbrella of immunity from third-party tort suit. Conversely, it is apparent that had the service company been working as an independent contractor, it would not have been entitled to such immunity. As the District Court correctly noted, the contract establishing the architect's relationship with the project was not attached to the complaint. However, from the allegations in the complaint, it is clear that the plaintiff assumed that the architect contracted with and agreed to work for the owner, not the employer, and was thus not eligible for Allen -type immunity from third-party tort suit. While the contract is a basis upon which the action is based, and is therefore required to be attached to or incorporated in the pleadings, pursuant to Rule 1.130(a), RCP, 30 F.S.A., and the failure to so attach the contract, could, therefore, subject the complaint to dismissal, Sachse v. Tampa Music Company, [11] the better approach under the facts of this case would have been for the trial court to have dismissed the complaint with leave to amend, rather than to have dismissed the complaint with prejudice. Properly, therefore, the District Court should have remanded the cause with instructions that the complaint be dismissed with leave to amend so as to allow compliance with the rule. If, on remand of this case, it is found that the architect was working as an independent contractor, i.e., that his contract was with the owner, and not the employer, then petitioner, as representative of the deceased employee of another independent contractor, may maintain against the architect an action at law for damages suffered as a result of the latter's negligence. Once again, this time in relation to the architect, the phrase, as a result of the latter's negligence, must be defined. We hereby choose to adopt the excellent, comprehensive definition of an architect's liability announced in Geer v. Bennett, supra : ... . [A]n architect who plans and supervises construction work as an independent contractor is under a duty to exercise ordinary care in the course thereof for the protection of any person who foreseeably and with reasonable certainty may be injured by his failure to do so. The law applicable to an architect's liability for personal injury or death may be summarized as follows. An architect may be liable for negligence in failing to exercise the ordinary skill of his profession, which results in the erection of an unsafe structure whereby anybody lawfully on the premises is injured. Possible liability for negligence resulting in personal injuries may be based upon their supervisory activities, or upon defects in the plans or both. Their possible liability is not limited to the owner who employed them. Privity of contract is not a prerequisite to liability. They are under a duty to exercise such reasonable care, technical skill and ability, and diligence as are ordinarily required of architects in the course of their plans, inspections and supervisions during construction for the protection of any person who foreseeably and with reasonable certainty might be injured by their failure to do so. An architect has been defined as one skilled in practical architecture, one whose profession it is to devise the plans and ornamentation of buildings or other structures and supervise their construction. An architect or engineer has also been defined as one whose special business it is to design buildings, fix the thickness of their walls, the supports necessary for the maintenance of them in their proper position, and do all other things in the line of his profession for the guidance of builders in the erection of buildings. Architecture is the art of building according to certain determined rules... . Decisions of other states make it clear that an architect is not under a duty to supervise construction... . However, architects do supervise as a matter of common practice ... and such supervision is properly within the scope of their professional capacities. When architects do undertake supervision of construction in addition to the preparation of plans, they generally are compensated separately or additionally, and if they perform their supervisory duties in a negligent fashion their liability therefor is separate and distinct from the liability of the party who negligently performs the actual building process... . [12] The allegations of petitioner's complaint against the architect sub judice, in light of the foregoing discussion of the phrase, as a result of the ... [architect's] negligence, clearly stated a cause of action against the architect, and, as clearly, were sufficient to withstand the architect's Motion to Dismiss. Therefore, the dismissal, with prejudice, of petitioner's complaint against the architect was erroneous, and the District Court's affirmance of that dismissal must be and hereby is reversed.