Opinion ID: 2139381
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Heading: Status and Duties: Current Indiana Premises Liability Law

Text: To address Burrell's arguments in context, we first examine the evolution and the current condition of premises liability law. During the last two centuries, English and American common law courts have categorized a person entering the land of another as an invitee, a licensee, or a trespasser. Marsh, The History and Comparative Law of Invitees, Licensees, and Trespassers, 69 Law.Q.Rev. 182 (1953). Following this scheme, Indiana courts have long said that the entrant's status on the land determines the duty that the landowner (or occupier) owes to him. See, e.g., Cleveland, C., C. & St. L. Ry. v. Means (1914), 59 Ind. App. 383, 391-93, 104 N.E. 785, 788, overruled on other grounds, Fort Wayne Nat'l Bank v. Doctor (1971), 149 Ind. App. 365, 374, 272 N.E.2d 876, 882; Barbre v. Indianapolis Water Co. (1980), Ind. App., 400 N.E.2d 1142, 1145. Our case law also outlines the duties landowners owe to each of the three status groups. First, a landowner owes a trespasser the duty to refrain from willfully or wantonly (intentionally) injuring him after discovering his presence. See Standard Oil Co. of Indiana v. Scoville (1961), 132 Ind. App. 521, 524, 175 N.E.2d 711, 713. Second, an Indiana landowner owes a licensee the duty to refrain from willfully or wantonly injuring him or acting in a manner to increase his peril. Barbre, 400 N.E.2d at 1146. The landowner also has a duty to warn a licensee of any latent danger on the premises of which the landowner has knowledge. Wright v. International Harvester Co. (1988), Ind. App., 528 N.E.2d 837, 839. [1] Third, a landowner owes the highest duty to an invitee: a duty to exercise reasonable care for his protection while he is on the landowner's premises. Hammond v. Allegretti (1974), 262 Ind. 82, 311 N.E.2d 821. The best definition of this duty comes from the Restatement (Second) of Torts § 343 (1965): A possessor of land is subject to liability for physical harm caused to his invitees by a condition on the land if, but only if, he (a) knows or by the exercise of reasonable care would discover the condition, and should realize that it involves an unreasonable risk of harm to such invitees, and (b) should expect that they will not discover or realize the danger, or will fail to protect themselves against it, and (c) fails to exercise reasonable care to protect them against the danger. This Court has used the definition in § 343 in resolving premises liability cases. Hammond, 262 Ind. at 85, 311 N.E.2d at 824; Douglass v. Irvin (1990), Ind., 549 N.E.2d 368, 370. While the duty owed to visitors in each of these categories has been a matter of settled law, Indiana appellate courts have had a more difficult time determining whether a trial court or jury properly defined the status of a given plaintiff. We have tended to rely on a few maxims for this task. Licensees and trespassers are those who enter premises for their own convenience, curiosity, or entertainment. See Gaboury v. Ireland Rd. Grace Brethren, Inc. (1983), Ind., 446 N.E.2d 1310, 1314 (both groups come for their own convenience); Barbre, 400 N.E.2d at 1146 (licensees come for their own convenience, curiosity or entertainment). Both groups take the premises as they find them. Gaboury, 446 N.E.2d at 1314. Unlike trespassers, however, licensees have a license to use the land. In other words, licensees are privileged to enter or remain on the land by virtue of the owner's or occupier's permission or sufferance. Scoville, 132 Ind. App. at 525, 175 N.E.2d at 713; see also Restatement (Second) of Torts § 330 comment c (possessor's consent). A brief foray into history makes it apparent that the distinction between licensees and invitees has become increasingly difficult to draw under current Indiana law. In the 1800's and very early 1900's, Indiana courts followed an invitation test [2] to separate invitees from licensees: When a person has a license to go upon the grounds or the enclosure of another, he takes the premises as he finds them, and accepts whatever perils he incurs in the use of such license. But when the owner or occupant, by enticement, allurement, or inducement, whether express or implied, causes another to come upon his lands, he then assumes the obligation of providing for the safety and protection of the person so coming, and for any breach of duty in that respect such owner or occupant becomes liable for any injury which may result to the person so caused to come onto his lands. The enticement, allurement, or inducement, as the case may be, must be the equivalent of an express or implied invitation. Mere acquiescence in the use of one's land by another is not sufficient. Such an implied invitation may be inferred from some act or line of conduct, or from some designation or dedication. Indiana, Bloomington & W. Ry. v. Barnhart (1888), 115 Ind. 399, 408, 16 N.E. 121, 125, quoted in Baltimore & O.S.W.R.R. v. Slaughter (1906), 167 Ind. 330, 335-36, 79 N.E. 186, 188. It is clear from this passage that the focus of the invitation test was on the invitation itself. The theory supporting the invitation test has been that if a landowner induces another person to enter his land by arrangement of the land or other conduct amounting to an express or reasonably implied invitation, then the landowner leads the entrant to believe that the land has been prepared for his safety. [3] Consequently, the landowner must be held to a reasonable duty of care. Around 1914, Indiana courts moved away from the invitation test toward an economic benefit test [4] in determining who was an invitee: A licensee by invitation [invitee] is a person who goes upon the lands of another with the express or implied invitation of the owner or occupant, either to transact business with such owner, or occupant, or to do some act which is of advantage to him (the owner or occupant) or of mutual advantage to both licensee and the owner or occupant of the premises. An invitation is implied from such a mutual interest. Cleveland, C., C. & St. L. Ry. v. Means, 59 Ind. App. at 394, 104 N.E. at 789. The theory underlying the economic benefit test has been described in the following fashion: The economic benefit theory proceeds on the assumption that affirmative obligations are imposed on people only in return for some consideration or benefit. Any obligation to discover latent dangerous conditions of the premises is regarded as an affirmative one, and the consideration for imposing it is sought in the economic advantage  actual or potential  of the plaintiff's visit to the occupier's own interest. [5] From 1914 to the late 1970's, Indiana courts generally followed the economic benefit test. See, e.g., Hammond v. Allegretti (1974), 262 Ind. 82, 311 N.E.2d 821; Standard Oil Co. of Indiana v. Scoville (1961), 132 Ind. App. 521, 175 N.E.2d 711. In 1978, the third district of the Indiana Court of Appeals began a new line of decisions demonstrating dissatisfaction with the economic benefit test. The first of these decisions was Mullins v. Easton (1978), 176 Ind. App. 590, 376 N.E.2d 1178. Mullins, an unpaid helper of a paid repairman, was injured while helping to carry a Roto Rooter out of the Eastons' basement. Mullins and his wife sued the Eastons. The trial court granted summary judgment for the Eastons after finding that Mullins was a licensee because he was not paid for his services. The Court of Appeals' opinion mingled ideas of invitation with ideas of economic benefit and concluded that Mullins was an invitee. What had been two different concepts seemed to become one: When the visitor has a purpose that is related to the occupant's pecuniary interest or advantage, an invitation to use the premises is inferred and the visitor's status is changed with a greater duty imposed. Such is often related to the regular ongoing business establishment in which liability is ultimately born by the enterprise itself. A corollary rule considers one an invitee if the possessor encourages another to enter to further his own purpose such that there arises the implicit assertion that reasonable care has been exercised to make the place safe for the one who came for that purpose. Id. at 594-95, 376 N.E.2d at 1181 (citations omitted). This use of the economic benefit test stretched the test beyond the reach of its theoretical underpinnings. Under Mullins, a traveling salesman who is injured after entering a landowner's property but before having an opportunity to do business with the landowner can make a valid argument that he entered the land with a purpose related to the landowner's pecuniary interest or advantage simply because he hoped to make a deal. The landowner, who gains no consideration or benefit from the salesman's presence, still gains the affirmative obligation to exercise a reasonable duty of care for the salesman's safety  exactly the opposite of the outcome that should be reached under the economic benefit theory. The dilution of the economic benefit test in Mullins cleared the way for the third district of the Court of Appeals to seek a new test for invitee status in Fleischer v. Hebrew Orthodox Congregation (1987), Ind. App., 504 N.E.2d 320, trans. denied, (1989), Ind., 539 N.E.2d 1. Mrs. Fleischer was injured while attending religious services at a synagogue. The Court of Appeals reversed a grant of summary judgment for the Congregation, holding that Mrs. Fleischer was an invitee. It used one of the two definitions of invitee found in Restatement (Second) of Torts § 332: (2) A public invitee is a person who is invited to enter or remain on land as a member of the public for a purpose for which the land is held open to the public. In adopting the Restatement definition, the court reasoned: More recent cases have broadened the business invitee test itself to require merely that the visitor's purpose be related to the owner or occupant's pecuniary interest or advantage. This court's further willingness to look at the invitation itself, and the implication of reasonable care that arises from it, indicates a drifting away from pecuniary benefit or interest as the sole test. Fleischer, 504 N.E.2d at 323 (citations omitted). Moving beyond Mullins, Fleischer signaled overt dissatisfaction with the economic benefit test. [6] The Fleischer court headed toward a more reasonable remedy for the dissatisfaction, clear movement away from an economic benefit test back to an invitation test. We believe that examination of the invitation itself must be the first step of any inquiry into invitee status. Much of the discomfort in our recent premises liability decisions reflects a sense late in this century that the economic benefit test promotes injustice when applied to social guest cases. As Judge Cardozo observed, such dysfunction is the foundation for the evolution of common law rules: Few rules in our time are so well established that they may not be called upon any day to justify their existence as a means adapted to an end. If they do not function, they are diseased. If they are diseased, they must not propagate their kind. Sometimes they are cut out and extirpated altogether. Sometimes they are left with the shadow of continued life, but sterilized, truncated, impotent for harm. We get a striking illustration of the force of logical consistency, then of its gradual breaking down before the demands of practical convenience in isolated or exceptional instances, and finally of the generative force of the exceptions as a new stock. .. . B. Cardozo, The Nature of the Judicial Process 98-99 (1921). When a test has become riddled with exceptions, [t]he law will have cause for gratitude to the deliverer who will strike the fatal blow. Id. at 155-56. Today, we complete the transition and adopt the invitation test as the analytical basis for deciding who is an invitee. Adoption of the invitation test leads us to declare that at least those persons described in the Restatement (Second) of Torts § 332 qualify as invitees: (1) An invitee is either a public invitee or a business visitor. (2) A public invitee is a person who is invited to enter or remain on land as a member of the public for a purpose for which the land is held open to the public. (3) A business visitor is a person who is invited to enter or remain on land for a purpose directly or indirectly connected with business dealings with the possessor of the land. We also note the following comments from Professor Keeton explaining subsection (3) of § 332: It is in connection with invitations to enter private land, not held open to the public, that possible pecuniary benefit has its greatest importance  but only as justifying an expectation that the place has been prepared and made safe for the visit. Prosser and Keeton on the Law of Torts § 61, at 424 (W. Keeton 5th ed. 1984) (citations omitted) (emphasis added).