Court Opinion

ID: 9852470
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:30:58.501312+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:28.383259
License: Public Domain

NOBLE, Justice (dissenting). I am unable to agree that the evidence substantially supports a finding of breach of a legal duty owing by defendant contractor to decedent. It must be noted at the outset that in New Mexico it is established that the attractive nuisance doctrine will not be extended to include ponds, pools and other natural or artificial bodies of water, ditches or canals. Mellas v. Lowdermilk, 58 N.M. 363, 271 P.2d 399. The majority point to the fact that decedent and his companion boarded what appeared to be a raft, but was actually a cement form, floating on the water of the excavation, from which decedent either fell or jumped into the water and was drowned. The fact that a raft or other object floats on a body of water does not change the general rule except where the float conceals an otherwise apparent risk, which we do not have in the present case. Lockridge v. Standard Oil Co., 124 Ind.App. 257, 114 N.E.2d 807; Rallo v. Heman Const. Co., 291 Mo. 221, 236 S.W. 632; Bass v. Quinn-Robbins Co., 70 Idaho 308, 216 P.2d 944; 36 A.L.R. 224-237. The facts pointed to as supporting a finding of negligence by the contractor are: (1) knowledge that children played around the excavations; (2) that only a single watchman was employed from four o’clock p. m. to midnight to guard the excavations, the equipment, and the project generally; (3) that all the excavations could not be guarded against the children of the area by a single watchman; and (4) that children had been seen playing in the excavation in which decedent drowned. The facts pointed to are such as might support a finding of negligence in the case of an attractive nuisance, but in my view do not substantially support a finding of breach of a legal duty owing by the contractor to decedent. An independent contractor in charge of a road or street under repair is charged with the duty of making adequate provision for the safety of the traveling public, but is not held to an insurer’s liability: Commonwealth v. Young, (Ky.), 354 S.W.2d 23, 24; Foster & Creighton Co. v. Hale, 32 Tenn.App. 208, 222 S.W.2d 222, and his liability can only be predicated upon the breach of a legal duty owed to the public. To recover against a highway contractor, the plaintiff must establish both a failure to exercise proper care in the performance of some legal duty owed by the contractor and that such negligent breach of duty was the proximate cause of the damage. Larsen v. Arizona Brewing Co., 84 Ariz. 191, 325 P.2d 829. Accordingly, a contractor may be liable for failure to guard or otherwise give warning of dangerous places in a road or street under repair whenever necessary for the reasonable protection of travelers, but not otherwise. Whipple v. State, 282 App.Div. 557, 125 N.Y.S.2d 52. A person must be on the highway for some legitimate purpose connected with travel thereon to be entitled to recover. Hay v. Hill, 137 Conn. 285, 76 A.2d 924; Hewison v. City of New Haven, 34 Conn. 136, 142, 91 Am.Dec. 718; Toler v. Hawkins, 188 Okl. 58, 105 P.2d 1041; Wedegartner v. Skoruppa (Tex.Civ.App.) 236 S.W.2d 216; Sherman White and Co. v. Long, 205 Tenn. 295, 326 S.W.2d 469. It has been held that a child may recover when negligently injured while playing on a street, but it must nevertheless be established that his play was in connection with legitimate travel on the highway. The play or pastime indulged in upon the street must not be inconsistent with his being a traveler thereon. Reed v. City of Madison, 83 Wis. 171, 53 N.W. 547, 549. Some states have statutes waiving the sovereign immunity and permitting recovery for negligence of the governmental agency in maintaining its streets or roads. Generally, these statutes only waive the governmental immunity but do not otherwise change the applicable rules. The rule is well stated in Beeson v. City of Los Angeles, 115 Cal.App. 122, 132, 300 P. 993, 997, (overruled on other grounds), where the court said: “In all of the cases thus far decided the injured party was using the street in which he was injured, or the property which caused the injury, in the usual and ordinary manner in which it was contemplated that the street or property would be used. We are of the opinion that in passing and adopting section two of the act approved June 13, 1923, the Legislature intended to limit the liability of the city for damages resulting from defective streets, works, or property to damages suffered in the ordinary, usual and customary use thereof. * * It is clear to me that the contractor had barricaded the entire portion of the street under repair with barricades sufficient to warn the traveling public of dangers caused by the construction. Obviously there is no requirement nor duty owed by a highway contractor, absent application of the attractive nuisance doctrine, to place signs to warn specifically of an obvious danger, or to have employee present to prevent children playing in such water-filled excavations. Whipple v. State, supra; Garrow v. State, 268 App.Div. 534, 52 N.Y.S.2d 155, aff’d 294 N.Y. 741, 61 N.E.2d 523. See, also, Potter v. Board of Commissioners of Port of New Orleans, La.App., 148 So.2d 439. Mellas v. Lowdermilk, supra, clearly established the rule in this jurisdiction that absent proof to the contrary a legal presumption exists that a child of nine years of age "had the capacity to comprehend and, avoid the danger he incurred in going upon the raft * * The presumption announced in Mellas shifted the burden of going forward with the evidence by establishing a prima facie case, and in the absence of evidence contracting the presumption, allows the party in favor of whom the presumption runs to establish his burden of proof as a matter of law, entitling him to a directed verdict. McCormick on Evidence, (1954 Ed.) p. 650, § 311. A review of the record fails to disclose any evidence regarding the “degree of care ordinarily exercised by children of like age, capacity, discretion, knowledge and experience under the same or similar circumstances (as decedent) for his own protection.” Under such circumstances, the test announced by the majority by which the conduct of a child is to be measured is inapplicable even if we assume it to be a correct test in certain instances. Absent the necessary evidence, no issue as to whether the decedent acted as an ordinary child is presented to the jury. Finding no evidence in the record to substantially support an implicit finding of a duty owed by the contractor to decedent, I dissent.