Court Opinion

ID: 9687358
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 16:26:09.366799+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:26.519818
License: Public Domain

G. BARRY ANDERSON, Judge
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent.
I believe the majority opinion in this case represents an extension of a very narrow exception that Minnesota courts have applied to negligence claims.
Historically, Minnesota courts have rejected negligence actions against a property owner for injuries to a tenant caused by the criminal activities of .another, usually finding that the property owner had no duty to protect the tenant. Spitzak v. Hylands, 500 N.W.2d 154 (Minn.App.1993); H.B. v. Whittemore, 552 N.W.2d 705, 709, 710 (Minn.1996) (no special relationship existed to impose a duty on a trailer-park manager to protect children from another resident even though the manager knew the resident , had a prior conviction for child molestation).
The exception expanded by the majority here provides that a duty may exist “if there is a special relationship between the parties and * * * the risk of harm is foreseeable.” N.W. v. Andersonj 478 N.W.2d 542, 544 (Minn.App.1991). That- case warned, however, that .the supreme court has developed “a rather rigid standard” and specifically went on to note that the *404standard applied only when “specific threats are made against specific victims.” Id. at 544.
There is no evidence in this case that the relationship between the decedent and the respondents was in any way special. At the end of the day this relationship was nothing more than an ordinary and routine landlord/tenant business transaction. If a special relationship exists here, under these facts, it is difficult to determine when a special relationship in any other ordinary landlord/tenant business transaction would not exist. Indeed, the principles enunciated here represent a worrisome expansion of landlord liability.
As to the alleged violation of the Minneapolis housing ordinance, because the issue was not raised at the district court it was waived and thus it need not be addressed by this court. Thiele v. Stick, 425 N.W.2d 580 (Minn.1988). But even if the principle in Thiele is not applied here and the merits of the claim are reached, the Minnesota Supreme Court has made clear in Bills v. Willow Run I Apartments, 547 N.W.2d 693, 695 (Minn.1996), that the principles of negligence per se do not apply unless the owner knew of the code violation and, among other things, failed to take reasonable steps to remedy the violation. There is little, if any, evidence in the record establishing either notice to the landlord or failure to cure by the landlord.
Ultimately, every crime is, to a greater or lesser extent, “foreseeable.” The Minnesota Supreme Court has, succinctly and thoroughly, addressed the difficulty of foreseeability in the context of criminal acts of third parties by noting:
The question whether a private party must provide protection for another is not solved merely by recourse to “foreseeability”. Everyone can foresee the commission of crime virtually anywhere and at any time. If foreseeability itself gave rise to a duty to provide “police” protection for others, every residential curtilage, every shop, every store, every manufacturing plant would have to be patrolled by private arms of the owner. And since hijacking and attack upon occupants of motor vehicles are also foreseeable, it would be the duty of every motorist to provide armed protection for his passengers and the property of others. Of course, none of this is at all palatable.
* * *
How can one know what measures will protect against the thug, the narcotic addict, the degenerate, the psychopath, the psychotic?
Pietila v. Congdon, 362 N.W.2d 328 (Minn.1985) (claim that private-property owner is liable in negligence for injuries suffered by a guest as a result of criminal attack [murder] ).
Under the facts of this case, there is no foreseeability, and thus no negligence, on the part of the landlord.
Finally, I would sustain the judgment of the district court simply because the plaintiff, under any legal theory, cannot establish causation. There isn’t a shred of evidence anywhere in the record demonstrating how the murderers entered the building and appellant addresses this issue only by way of an affidavit in which it is noted that the murderers “must have” entered the building through the back door. There is no particular reason to believe this as there are no eye witnesses to the entrance of the murderers onto the property, no documentary or visual entrance that the murderers entered through the back door and, indeed, there isn’t even any sign of forcible entry into the decedent’s apartment. Even assuming the highly dubious existence of a duty and a breach of duty, plaintiffs must still demonstrate a causal connection between the *405breach and injury and this they have not done. The district court should be affirmed on the basis of causation alone,
I would affirm the grant of summary judgment rendered by the district court,