Court Opinion

ID: 9774894
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 18:37:35.463805+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:32:17.513902
License: Public Domain

Steele Hays, Justice, dissenting. This case was submitted to the trial court on motion for summary judgment with extensive supporting and opposing materials. The trial court determined that appellant had used the appellee’s walk-in hot water pool with whirlpool on numerous prior occasions and was warned by a sign in place near the whirlpool intake advising users to stay at least twelve inches from the pumps. In response to appellant’s claim that she was an invitee, the trial court determined that appellant had failed to establish that she had come on the premises for the business benefit of the appellee, citing Coleman v. United Fence Company, 282 Ark. 344, 668 S.W.2d 536 (1984). The trial court noted an absence of any proof that appellant was induced to accept employment because of the whirlpool and that its permissive use was nothing more than a gratuitous act by the appellee. See Garrett v. Arkansas Power & Light Co., 218 Ark. 575, 437 S.W.2d 895 (1951), where we said: It is sometimes difficult to distinguish between an invitee and a licensee, especially where each is implied, but a rule to do so was quoted with approval in the case of Knight v. Farmers’ & Merchants’ Gin Co., 159 Ark. 423, 252 S.W. 30, as follows: “It is not always clear under a given state of facts as to what inference may be drawn as to a person being a licensee or an invitee but one of the sure tests is whether or not the owner of the premises is interested in the presence of the visitor.” The trial court also rejected the alternative argument that appellant was a licensee. That contention was not pled but was raised orally and rejected on the ground that no evidence of wanton conduct by the appellee was pled or demonstrated. King v. Jackson, 302 Ark. 540, 790 S.W.2d 904 (1990). Appellant has not shown the trial court’s rulings to have been erroneous and I believe summary judgment was appropriate.