Court Opinion

ID: 9689295
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 18:27:06.855045+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:46.804967
License: Public Domain

TODD, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. The trial in this case occurred before our decision in Seim v. Garavalia, 306 N.W.2d 806 (Minn.1981). The instructions of the trial court and the majority opinion are contrary to the holding of this court in the Seim case. In that case former Chief Justice Robert Sheran makes a thorough and comprehensive analysis of the dog bite statute. The opinion concludes that it is improper to submit the negligence of a minor plaintiff to the jury because the statute imposed absolute liability. In the Seim case the trial judge had directed a verdict on the issue of liability. In this case the trial judge not only refused to direct such a verdict, but submitted a special interrogatory to the jury. The form of the question improperly places in this case the issue of the minor’s negligence. The majority opinion seeks to avoid this problem by focusing on the act of the minor child in attempting to pet the dog, finding it to be a provocative act, thus relieving the owner of absolute liability. This approach ignores the fact that in the Seim case we sustained a directed verdict on statutory liability which involved an act of petting the dog involved. I would hold in this case, as a matter of law, that the act of the minor child in offering to pet a dog is not a provocative act under the statute. I would reverse the trial court and remand for a new trial on all issues including damages.