Opinion ID: 1218193
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: State's Liability for Damage Caused by Wild Animals

Text: Since the State's conduct in this case is not within the discretionary act exception to the waiver of sovereign immunity in the Alaska Tort Claims Act, it is subject to review under the ordinary principles of negligence. See Webb v. City and Borough of Sitka, 561 P.2d 731, 733 & n. 9 (Alaska 1977). In Webb we adopted the following rule: A landowner or owner of other property must act as a reasonable person in maintaining his property in a reasonably safe condition in view of all the circumstances, including the likelihood of injury to others, the seriousness of the injury, and the burden on the respective parties of avoiding the risk. Id. at 733 (footnote omitted). Whether particular conduct is reasonable under the circumstances is generally considered a question of fact for the jury. It is therefore ordinarily not an appropriate issue for determination on a motion for summary judgment. Id. at 735. Since the case at bar also presents several unresolved questions of fact, [7] it is particularly necessary that it be submitted to a jury for determination. There is a surprising dearth of case law  not only in Alaska but also in other states and in the federal courts  on the issue of liability for damage caused by a wild animal when the animal is not under the control of the defendant. The parties have not cited and this court has been unable to locate any case with facts precisely analogous to those of the case at bar. The few cases that have considered similar facts, however, appear to agree that, if a landowner knows that a wild animal is creating a dangerous situation on his property, he has a duty either to remove the danger or to warn the people who may be threatened by the danger. The most helpful case appears to be Wamser v. City of St. Petersburg, 339 So.2d 244 (Fla.App. 1976). Wamser involved a lawsuit against a city by a swimmer who had been attacked by a shark at a city-operated beach. The court held that, because the danger was not reasonably foreseeable, the city had no duty to guard the swimmer against a shark attack or to warn him of the possibility of such an attack. The city also was found to have no duty to seek information about the frequency of sharks in the beach area, since no shark attacks had ever occurred at the beach so as to indicate the necessity for obtaining such information. Similarly, in Mann v. State, 47 N.Y.S.2d 553 (Ct.Cl. 1944), the State was found not liable for damages to a car caused when a deer ran across the highway. The court held that the State could not be held liable for failure to erect fences or post warning signs where plaintiff did not allege that the State had actual or constructive notice of a dangerous situation. See also Morrison v. State, 204 Misc. 222, 123 N.Y.S.2d 105 (Ct. Cl. 1952) (where deer crossing highway creates hazard, State may have duty to post warning signs). There are several cases involving visitors to national parks who were attacked by bears. Claypool v. United States, 98 F. Supp. 702 (S.D.Cal. 1951), involved a park visitor who was injured by a grizzly bear in Yellowstone National Park. The visitor had asked a park ranger if it was safe to camp in a particular campsite. Although a bear had raided that particular campsite only a few days earlier injuring several people, the ranger assured the visitor it was safe to camp there. Id. at 703. The court found that the government had a duty to warn under the circumstances. Id. at 706. In contrast, the government was found not liable for another Yellowstone bear attack in Rubenstein v. United States, 338 F. Supp. 654 (N.D.Cal. 1972). In this instance the visitor had been given the usual warning brochures on the dangers of bears, and park officials had no specific knowledge of bears in the area of the campsite where the attack occurred. The court held that the government could not be held liable for the completely unforeseeable actions of wild animals. See also Martin v. United States, 564 F.2d 1355 (9th Cir.1976), cert. denied, 432 U.S. 906, 97 S.Ct. 2950, 53 L.Ed.2d 1078 (1977); Ashley v. United States, 215 F. Supp. 39 (D.Neb. 1963), aff'd per curiam, 326 F.2d 499 (8th Cir.1964). [8] These cases suggest some of the factual questions which remain to be resolved in the case at bar. It will be necessary to decide, for example, the extent of the State's knowledge of the presence of bears at the Robe River turnout; whether it was reasonably foreseeable that a bear would attack a person who was using the turnout; and whether the State had sufficient knowledge of danger so as to give rise to a duty to post warning signs. These questions and possibly others must be resolved by the finder of fact. REVERSED and REMANDED for trial.