Court Opinion

ID: 9518743
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 01:00:56.029909+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:31:45.193570
License: Public Domain

LAVORATO, Chief Justice,
(concurring specially).
In Sheets v. Ritt, Ritt & Ritt, Inc., four justices of this court decided to abrogate the common-law distinctions in' premises liability cases between invitees and licensees. 581 N.W.2d 602, 606 (Iowa 1998). They stopped short of deciding “whether a distinction should persist with regard to trespassers,” leaving that question “for an appropriate case in which the parties can test whether the special nature of an act of trespass still calls for a continuation of that entrant’s status.” Id.
For reasons that follow, I suggest the four justices in Sheets were correct in their decision to abolish the common-law duty distinctions between invitees and licensees in premises liability cases. See id. As for trespassers, I would follow the lead of those states that have abolished the distinction between invitees and licensees but have retained the common-law rules regarding trespassers. See Washington Metro. Area Transit Auth. v. Ward, 433 A.2d 1072, 1073-74 (D.C.1981); Wood v. Camp, 284 So.2d 691, 693, 695 (Fla.1973); Jones v. Hansen, 254 Kan. 499, 867 P.2d 303, 310 (1994); Poulin v. Colby College, 402 A.2d 846, 851 (Me.1979); Mounsey v. Ellard, 363 Mass. 693, 297 N.E.2d 43, 51-52, 51 n. 7 (1973); Peterson v. Balach, 294 Minn. 161, 199 N.W.2d 639, 642 (1972); Heins v. Webster County, 250 Neb. 750, 552 N.W.2d 51, 57 (1996); Ford v. Bd. of County Comm’rs, 118 N.M. 134, 879 P.2d 766, 770 (1994); Nelson v. Freeland, 349 N.C. 615, 507 S.E.2d 882, 892 (1998); O’Leary v. Coenen, 251 N.W.2d 746, 751 (N.D.1977); Hudson v. Gaitan, 675 S.W.2d 699, 703 (Tenn.1984), overruled in part on other grounds by McIntyre v. Balentine, 833 S.W.2d 52, 54, 57 (Tenn.1992); Mallet v. Pickens, 206 W.Va. 145, 522 S.E.2d 436, 446 (1999); Antoniewicz v. Reszcynski, 70 Wis.2d 836, 236 N.W.2d 1, 5, 11 (1975); Clarke v. Beckwith, 858 P.2d 293, 296 (Wyo.1993). This approach represents the middle ground.
I. Background. To understand why I favor abolishing the distinction between invitees and licensees, some historical background is in order. The evolution of the common-law trichotomy of invitee, licensee, and trespasser came about in a much different time and in a wholly different legal climate from the one that exists today. Mallet, 522 S.E.2d at 439.
The trichotomy “traces its roots to nineteenth-century England.” Nelson; 507 *81S.E.2d at 887 (citing John Ketchum, Missouri Declines an Invitation to Join the Twentieth Century: Preservation of the Licensee-Invitee Distinction in Carter v. Kinney, 64 UMKC L.Rev. 393, 394 (1995)). The trichotomy “emanated from an English culture deeply rooted to the land; tied with feudal heritage; and wrought with lords whose land ownership represented power, wealth, and dominance.” Id. (citing same). Although “aware of the threat that unlimited landowner freedom and its accompanying immunity placed upon the community,” nineteenth-century courts nevertheless “refused to provide juries with unbounded authority to determine premises-liability cases.” Id. (citing Michael Sears, Abrogation of the Traditional Common Law of Premises Liability, 44 U. Kan. L.Rev. 175, 176 (1995)). They did so because “juries were comprised mainly of potential land entrants who most likely would act to protect the community at large and thereby reign in the landowner’s sovereign power over his land.” Id. (citing same). The trichotomy was therefore “created to disgorge the jury of some of its power by either allowing the judge to take the case from the jury based on legal rulings or by forcing the jury to apply the mechanical rules of the trichotomy instead of considering the pertinent issue of whether the landowner acted reasonably in maintaining his land.” Id.
Moreover, the trichotomy came about at a time when negligence principles were not in existence. Id. (citing Norman S. Marsh, The History and Comparative Law of Invitees, Licensees and Trespassers, 69 Law Q. Rev. 182, 184 (1953)). When these principles did emerge, they conflicted with the immunity conferred upon landowners under the trichotomy. Id. (citing Kathryn E. Eriksen, Premises Liability in Texas— Time for a “Reasonable” Change, 17 St. Mary’s L.J. 417, 421 (1986)). Despite the conflict, common-law courts refused to replace the trichotomy with modern principles of negligence law, “as they did in almost all other tort areas, but rather ‘superimposed the new [negligence] principles upon the existing framework of entrant categories.’ ” Id. at 887-88 (quoting Sears, Abrogation of the Traditional Common Law of Premises Liability, 44 U. Kan. L.Rev. at 176 (1995)). As a result, we now have the “current scheme of premises-liability law which allows judges to maintain control over jury discretion while, at the same time, utilizing ‘duty of care’ principles set forth in negligence theory.” Id. at 888 (citing same).
II. The Change. Ironically, the first move toward abolishing the trichotomy occurred in England, the jurisdiction that gave rise to the trichotomy. In 1957, England passed the Occupier’s Liability Act which abolished the distinction between invitees and licensees. See Occupier’s Liability Act, 5 & 6 Eliz. 2, c. 31 (1957) (Eng.). The Act imposed upon the occupier of land a “common duty of care” toward all persons who lawfully enter the premises. Id.
Two years later, the United States Supreme Court criticized the trichotomy and refused to import it into admiralty law. See Kermarec v. Compagnie Generale Transatlantique, 358 U.S. 625, 630-32, 79 S.Ct. 406, 409—410, 3 L.Ed.2d 550, 554-55 (1959). The Court noted that “[t]he distinctions which the common law draws between licensee and invitee were inherited from a culture deeply rooted to the land, a culture which traced many of its standards to a heritage of feudalism.” Id. at 630, 79 S.Ct. at 410, 3 L.Ed.2d at 554. The Court further noted:
In an effort to do justice in an industrialized urban society, with its complex economic and individual relationships, modern common-law courts have found *82it necessary to formulate increasingly subtle verbal refinements, to create sub-classifications among traditional common-law categories, and to delineate fine gradations in the standards of care which the landowner owes to each. Yet even within a single jurisdiction, the classifications and subclassifications bred by the common law have produced confusion and conflict. As new distinctions have been spawned, older ones have become obscured. Through this semantic morass the common law has moved, unevenly and with hesitation, towards “imposing on owners and occupiers a single duty of reasonable care in all the circumstances.”
Id. at 630-31, 79 S.Ct. at 410, 3 L.Ed.2d at 554-55 (footnotes omitted).
Nine years following Kermarec, California abolished its traditional duty classification scheme of invitees, licensees, and trespassers and replaced it with ordinary negligence principles. Rowland v. Christian, 69 Cal.2d 108, 70 Cal.Rptr. 97, 443 P.2d 561, 568-69 (Cal.1968). Rowland provided the impetus for a number of jurisdictions to reassess the viability of the trichotomy as outlined in the majority opinion in the case before this court.
In recent times, this court has been poised to abandon the trichotomy. For example, four years after Rowland, this court questioned the future applicability of the trichotomy, citing and discussing Kermarec and Rowland. See Rosenau v. City of Estherville, 199 N.W.2d 125, 135-36 (Iowa 1972). In two other cases, this court expressed its displeasure with the trichoto-my. See Paul v. Luigi’s, Inc., 557 N.W.2d 895, 897 (Iowa 1997) (explaining our reluctance to conclusively establish land possessor’s duty of care on the basis of injured party’s status); Pottebaum v. Hinds, 347 N.W.2d 642, 645 (Iowa 1984) (same). Finally, as mentioned, four justices of this court took the step anticipated in Paul, Pottebaum, and Rosenau and decided to abrogate the distinction in premises liability cases between invitees and licensees. See Sheets, 581 N.W.2d at 606.
III. Reasons for Abolishing the Distinction Between Invitees and Licensees. As I mentioned, inherent in the trichotomy is the notion that a jury could not be trusted to enter a just verdict. As one court observed, “jurisdictions retaining the trichotomy fear that plaintiff-oriented juries — like feudal juries composed mostly of land entrants — will impose unreasonable burdens upon defendant-landowners.” Nelson, 507 S.E.2d at 888. The same court answers the argument by noting that juries have properly applied negligence principles in all other areas
of tort law, and there has been no indication that defendants in other areas have had unreasonable burdens placed upon them. Moreover, given that modern jurors are more likely than feudal jurors to be landowners themselves, it is unlikely that they would be willing to place a burden upon a defendant that they would be unwilling to accept upon themselves.
Id.; see also Jones, 867 P.2d at 310 (“Studies suggest that abolition of the distinctions between the duty owed to an invitee and that owed to a licensee has not altered greatly the results reached, has not left the juries without direction or standards by which to judge the action of the occupier of lands, and has resulted in outcomes that would probably be the same as if the status rules had been applied.”)
Perhaps the most important reason for abolishing the distinction is that the tricho-tomy has led to confusion in the law and inequity in the cases decided. Recovery by an entrant in many instances “has become largely a matter of chance, dependent upon the pigeonhole in which the law *83has put him, e.g. ‘trespasser,’ ‘licensee,’ or ‘invitee’ — each of which has had radically different consequences in law.” Peterson, 199 N.W.2d at 643. Consider the following:
A canvasser who comes on your premises without your consent is a trespasser. Once he has your consent, he is a licensee. Not until you do business with him is he an invitee. Even when you have done business with him, it seems rather strange that your duty towards him should be different when he comes up to your door from what it was when he goes away. Does he change his colour in the middle of the conversation? What is the position when you discuss business with him and it comes to nothing? No confident answer can be given to these questions. Such is the morass into which the law has floundered in trying to distinguish between licensees and invitees.
Mallet, 522 S.E.2d at 441 (citations omitted). The point is that “[i]t is often difficult, if not impossible, to discern an entrant’s status.” Vega v. Piedilato, 154 N.J. 496, 713 A.2d 442, 450 (N.J.1998) (Handler, J., concurring). Mallet cites the following examples from other jurisdictions underscoring the tortured logic courts have gone through in applying the tricho-tomy: Franconia Assoc. v. Clark, 250 Va. 444, 463 S.E.2d 670 (Va.1995) (considering whether mall employee lost status as an invitee by attempting to stop a robber); Lakeview Assoc. Ltd. v. Maes, 907 P.2d 580 (Colo.1995) (discussing whether tenant, who paid rent but happened to not own a car, was invitee or licensee when she fell while walking across the parking lot of an apartment complex); Peterson v. Romine, 131 Idaho 537, 960 P.2d 1266 (Idaho 1998) (considering whether plaintiff who parked in downtown parking lot provided for shoppers, but who shopped at an adjacent but unaffiliated store, was therefore not a business invitee when she was injured by stepping into a pothole); and Gladon v. Greater Cleveland Reg'l Transit Auth., 75 Ohio St.3d 312, 662 N.E.2d 287 (Ohio 1996) (questioning whether fare-paying customer of subway system, who was assaulted and thrown onto tracks by third parties upon exiting train, was still invitee when left lying on tracks and struck by train). Mallet, 522 S.E.2d at 447 n. 7.
The court in Mallet makes the point that in cases like these the question should not be whether the plaintiff was a licensee or invitee. Rather, the question should be were the premises in question safe? Or, alternatively, “did the landowner exercise reasonable care under the circumstances to ensure that [the premises were] safe for a reasonably forseeable event, namely, that someone [might be injured under the circumstances]?” Id. at 442. As the court observed, “[f]raming the question in this manner is important, because it recognizes that neither landowners nor entrants make decisions with these archaic distinctions in mind.” Id.
I agree with the Mallet court’s ultimate conclusion:
If we wish for our law to be predictable, and we do, then we have a duty to shape it in such a way that it meshes with the general, reasonable assumptions that people make in their daily lives. Because the common law distinction between invitee and licensee does not meet that standard, it should be discarded.
Id. at 443.
Closely aligned with this view is the Massachusetts Supreme Court’s reason for abolishing the distinction between licensees and invitees:
The problem of allocating the costs and risks of human injury is far too complex to be decided solely by the status of the entrant, especially where the status *84question often prevents the jury from ever determining the fundamental question whether the defendant has acted reasonably in light of all the circumstances in the particular case.
Mounsey, 2A1 N.E.2d at 51.
The court in Mounsey also answered those critics who say abolishing the licensee-invitee distinction will leave the jury without any standards:
The abolition of the licensee-invitee distinction and the creation of a “reasonable care in all the circumstances” standard will not leave the jury without standards to guide their determination of reasonable conduct. The principles which are now to be applied are those which have always governed personal negligence. Our decision merely prevents the plaintiffs status as a licensee or invitee from being the sole determinative factor in assessing the occupier’s liability. However, the foreseeability of the visitor’s presence and the time, manner, place and surrounding circumstances of his entry remain relevant factors which will determine “in part the likelihood of injury to him, and the extent of the interest which must be sacrificed to avoid the risk of injury.”
Id. at 52 (citations omitted). Simply put, landowners would merely be required to take reasonable care to prevent foreseeable harm. See Carl S. Hawkins, Premises Liability After Repudiation of the Status Categories: Allocation of Judge and Jury Functions, 1981 Utah L.Rev. 15, 61 (1981) (concluding ordinary negligence principles have constrained jury discretion in premises liability cases in jurisdictions that abolished the classification system).
A final reason for abolishing the distinction is that our modern social mores and humanitarian values place more importance on human life than on property. Mark J. Welter, Comment, Premises Liability: A Proposal to Abrogate the Status Distinctions of “Trespasser,” “Licensee” And “Invitee” as Determinative of a Land Occupier’s Duty of Care Owed to an Entrant, 33 S.D. L.Rev. 66, 84 (1987-88). Thus,
[a] man’s life or limb does not become less worthy of protection by the law nor a loss less worthy of compensation under the law because he has come upon the land of another without permission or with permission but without a business purpose. Reasonable people do not ordinarily vary their conduct depending upon such matters, and to focus upon the status of the injured party as trespasser, licensee, or invitee in order to determine the question whether the landowner has a duty of care, is contrary to our modern social mores and humanitarian values.
Rowland, 70 Cal.Rptr. 97, 443 P.2d at 568.
When the reasons for the rule disappear, the rule ought to disappear. The reasons for the licensee-invitee distinction are no longer viable. Therefore, the distinction ought to be abolished. See Funk v. United States, 290 U.S. 371, 383, 54 S.Ct. 212, 216, 78 L.Ed. 369, 376 (1933) (“It has been said so often as to have become axiomatic that the common law is not immutable but flexible, and by its own principles adapts itself to varying conditions.”).
IY. Trespassers. The concurring opinion in Mounsey notes that the logic of the argument for abolishing the distinction between licensees and invitees is equally persuasive regarding trespassers. See Mounsey, 297 N.E.2d at 57-58 (Kaplan, J., concurring). The concurring opinion explains that “it is sometimes just as hard to distinguish trespassers from licensees or invitees, as to distinguish licensees from invitees; and the class of trespassers is probably just as various as either of the other classes.” Id. at 57. Although the *85court in Mounsey abolished the distinction between licensees and invitees but retained the common-law rule as to trespassers, the court later adopted the reasonable care standard for “physically trapped trespassers.” Pridgen v. Boston Housing Auth., 364 Mass. 696, 308 N.E.2d 467, 477 (Mass.1974).
A treatise writer explains the rationale for retaining a separate rule for trespassers:
[I]n a civilization based on private ownership, it is considered a socially desirable policy to allow a person to use his own land in his own way, without the burden of watching for and protecting those who come there without permission or right.
W. Page Keeton et al., Prosser and Keeton on the Law of Torts § 58, at 395 (5th ed.1984) [hereinafter Prosser].
One court justifies the separate rule this way:
[I]nvitees and licensees enter another’s lands under color of right, [but] a trespasser has no basis for claiming extended protection. There remains the possibility that the abandonment of the status of trespasser would place an unfair burden on a landowner who has no reason to expect a trespasser’s presence.
Poulin, 402 A.2d at 851 n. 5.
I think for the reasons expressed in Prosser and Poulin we should retain the common-law rule for parties who are trespassers. It remains to be seen whether this court might want to recognize an exception like the Massachusetts court did in Pridgen. Therefore, at this time I have no reason to disagree with the majority’s refusal to abolish the common-law rule as to trespassers.
LARSON, J., joins this special concurrence. STREIT, J., concurs specially in a separate opinion.