Court Opinion

ID: 9789376
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 01:35:42.769323+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:44:58.822499
License: Public Domain

MEANS, Presiding Judge,
dissenting.
This appeal was placed on the Accelerated Docket for early disposition. Oral argument was held on March 1, 1986.
Plaintiffs appeal from the trial court’s order which sustained Defendant’s demurrer to the evidence. Having reviewed the record and applicable law, I would affirm.
In July 1983, Plaintiff was injured when he was hit in the leg by an object which was thrown from a lawn mower. Cahill had just left Defendant’s restaurant and was on Defendant’s premises when he was injured. The mower was owned and operated by Joseph Streeter, employed by Defendant as an independent contractor to do the yard work surrounding the restaurant. At the time of Cahill’s injury, Streeter was mowing in an area referred to as a “rock garden.”
Cahill sued Defendant Waugh, as owner of the restaurant, but did not name Street-er as a defendant in the lawsuit. The case was tried on theories of premises liability and respondeat superior. The case went to the jury on the respondeat superior issues and the jury returned a verdict in favor of Defendant, implicitly finding that Defendant was not responsible for the actions of Streeter. Defendant entered a demurrer to Cahill’s evidence concerning premises liability. The court found that there was no evidence to show that Defendant had any knowledge, either actual or constructive, of the allegedly dangerous condition and sustained the demurrer. Cahill has appealed from the order sustaining the demurrer, but has not appealed the jury verdict.
A demurrer to the evidence is properly sustained if there is no evidence reasonably tending to support the plaintiff’s cause of action. Wilson v. Chicago, Rock Island, & Pacific R.R., 429 P.2d 763 (Okla.1967). Where there is no competent evidence reasonably tending to support the plaintiff’s case, a judgment of the trial court sustaining a demurrer to the evidence will not be reversed. Pitts v. First State Bank, 390 P.2d 867 (Okla.1963). The decisive question is whether Cahill’s evidence, construed most favorably to Cahill, is sufficient to entitle him to any relief against Defendant. Shelby v. Hudiburg Chevrolet, Inc., 361 P.2d 275, 276 (Okla.l961)(per curiam). A review of the evidence in the instant case shows that the demurrer was properly sustained.
In order for Cahill to reach the jury on the issue of premises liability, the elements as set out in Rogers v. Hennessee, 602 P.2d 1033 (Okla.1979), must first be met. As in Rogers, the parties here are in an invitor-in-vitee relationship. The court stated Defendant’s duty in the following:
The law casts on the invitor the duty to exercise reasonable care to keep the premises in a reasonably safe condition and to warn invitees of conditions which are in the nature of hidden dangers, traps, snares, pitfalls and the like. All normal or ordinary risks incident to the use of the premises are assumed by the invitee. No liability arises for any injury resulting from dangers which are so apparent or readily observable that one would reasonably expect them to be discovered. Moreover, failure to remove known but obvious hazards by alteration or reconstruction of the premises constitutes no breach of duty.
Id. at 1034 (footnotes omitted).
In the instant case, as in Rogers, there was no proof that Defendant knew Streeter *726was mowing in the rock garden. Although Defendant Waugh testified that Streeter had been performing the mowing and yard work at The Pancake Place for quite some time, he stated that he had never seen him using a mower in the rocky area. The restaurant manager who was working that morning had never noticed Streeter mowing in that area. Like the plaintiff in Rogers, Cahill would have this court infer Defendant’s lack of due care from Streeter’s testimony that he had used the mower there before. However, there is no evidence that Defendant had any knowledge of Streeter’s mowing in the rocky area, nor of the length of time that he had been operating the mower on the morning of the accident. As in Rogers, there is no evidence tending to show at the critical time and place that the owner had knowledge, actual or constructive, of the offending defect or was negligent in failing to discover it. There is no evidence that Defendant had any knowledge at any time that Street-er had ever operated the mower improperly-
Assuming all Cahill’s facts as true, there is still no evidence which tends to show that at the time of the accident, Defendant had any knowledge, actual or constructive, that Streeter was operating the lawn mower in close proximity to the entrance and in the rocky area. Likewise, there is no evidence to tend to show that Defendant was negligent in its failure to discover Street-er’s actions. The trial court properly sustained the demurrer.