Court Opinion

ID: 9847588
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:02:39.016429+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:17:21.256375
License: Public Domain

*99Andrews, Presiding Judge,
dissenting.
The majority holds that Brookview’s abandonment of the security measures undertaken by its predecessor amounts to a breach of a “contractual duty” sufficient, without any showing of actual negligence, to defeat Brookview’s motion for summary judgment (p. 94). This flouts longstanding precedent, quoted by the majority, that the breach of an assumed duty is actionable only “ ‘if.. . it also violates a duty owed to [a] plaintiff independent of contract to avoid harming him’ ” (p. 94, emphasis supplied, quoting Orkin Exterminating Co. v. Stevens, 130 Ga. App. 363, 365 (203 SE2d 587) (1973)). Moreover, though it is true that the tenants of this community “believed that they were paying for security” (p. 92, emphasis supplied), undisputed testimony shows that the plaintiff in this case knew that security was no longer being provided. Because nothing in the record supports an inference that the harm Pantoja suffered was foreseeable, and because nothing that Brookview did or failed to do could have reasonably misled Pantoja into acting with less care on the night of his death, I dissent.
The majority holds that because Brookview continued to charge its tenants the same $5 monthly security fee charged by its predecessor even after it discontinued the security measures undertaken by that predecessor, Brookview may be held liable for damages arising from a tort occurring in the wake of that discontinuance. Georgia law holds otherwise. Lau’s Corp. v. Haskins, 261 Ga. 491 (405 SE2d 474) (1991), is familiar to every student of the principles governing a grant of summary judgment. Id. (where a defendant shows an absence of “evidence sufficient to create a genuine issue as to any essential element of plaintiffs claim, that claim tumbles like a house of cards”). It is less well known that the Supreme Court of Georgia articulated these principles as it affirmed a grant of summary judgment to a landowner on the question whether he had negligently undertaken security in a high-crime area:
A landowner does not become an insurer of safety by taking some security precautions on behalf of invitees. Undertaking measures to protect patrons does not heighten the standard of care; and taking some measures does not ordinarily constitute evidence that further measures might be required. In all cases, a landowner is not required to do more than is reasonable for the protection of invitees.
(Footnote omitted; emphasis supplied.) Id. at 494-495.
Even assuming that the charging of a security fee amounts to an undertaking to provide security, it is simply wrong to hold that such an undertaking can abrogate the fundamental rule that a landowner *100can be held liable only for foreseeable harms occurring on its property. Lau’s Corp., supra; Ritz Carlton Hotel Co. v. Revel, 216 Ga. App. 300, 304 (2) (454 SE2d 183) (1995) (undertaking measures to protect patrons does not heighten standard of care and is immaterial in light of fact that the particular crime was unforeseeable). When the majority imposes the possibility of liability on this landowner, it positively discourages all landowners from taking feasible measures to protect their tenants and visitors from harm, since those measures could not be discontinued without raising an inference that reasonable care is no longer being taken. See Doe v. Prudential-Bache/A. G. Spanos Realty Partners, 222 Ga. App. 169, 173-175 (2), (3) (474 SE2d 31) (1996) (affirming grant of summary judgment where record showed no evidence of substantially similar incidents, and rejecting plaintiffs theory that landowner had breached an assumed duty).
It is true that when a plaintiff reasonably relies on a landowner’s assurances or acts, harm resulting from such reliance may be actionable. As the Supreme Court noted in Lau’s Corp.:
If a defendant undertakes to do more for the benefit of another person than the law requires, he or she may be held liable if he or she acts unreasonably or makes the situation worse, by increasing the danger, or by misleading the plaintiff into belief that it has been removed, or by depriving the plaintiff of the possibility of help from other sources, etc.
(Emphasis supplied.) Lau’s Corp., supra at 495, n. 2. The majority pursues this scenario when it asserts that Brookview’s practice of continuing to charge its tenants for security, coupled with its failure to tell them that it had in fact been discontinued, misled them into the false belief that security was still being provided, with any danger from intruder crime thus reduced or removed. In this case, however, the uncontroverted testimony of Pantoja’s own daughter proves that such circumstances are absent:
Q. When did you change your mind [concerning the safety of the trailer park]?
A. Well, I had some concerns the last month [before his death] at the first of February because my father came to me with some complaints about being charged for security and not being provided that security. . . .
Q. But he realized that there was no security out there; is that what you’re saying?
A. Apparently that had been the complaint of a number of the persons living in the park. . . .
*101Decided March 29, 2007
Reconsideration denied April 13, 2007
Charles C. Mayers, Warren C. Grice, for appellant.
Shepard, Plunkett, Hamilton, Boudreaux & Tisdale, Todd M. Boudreaux, John A. Tisdale, Gorby, Reeves & Peters, Michael J. Gorby, for appellees.
Q. [D]id you take that issue [of security] up with anyone at Augusta Estates?
A. My father was an independent person. I was his daughter and not his mother, so I suggested simply that he needed to do that.
Pantoja not only knew that security had been discontinued, but was encouraged by his own daughter to voice his dissatisfaction with continuing to pay for it. From February 1 forward, then, including the night on which he died, Pantoja could not have reasonably relied on security he knew was not there. See Doe v. Prudential-Bache, supra at 174-175 (3) (plaintiff could not reasonably rely on security to prevent all harms where the defects of the parking garage where she was attacked were open and obvious).
Recalling that “[i]n all cases, a landowner is not required to do more than is reasonable for the protection of invitees,” Lau’s Corp., supra at 495 (3), and thus responding to the familiar question whether the harm Pantoja suffered was foreseeable, this Court must reverse the trial court’s denial of summary judgment because no substantially similar crime had occurred on the property before the attack resulting in Pantoja’s death. See Agnes Scott College v. Clark, 273 Ga. App. 619, 622 (1) (616 SE2d 468) (2005) (college properly granted summary judgment where no violent crimes had been reported in parking lot from which plaintiff was abducted); Baker v. Simon Property Group, 273 Ga. App. 406, 407-408 (1) (614 SE2d 793) (2005) (mall owner properly granted summary judgment where shooting of patron in parking lot was not foreseeable); Woods v. Kim, 207 Ga. App. 910, 911 (429 SE2d 262) (1993) (store owner properly granted summary judgment where there was no evidence that his security efforts in a high-crime area were below a reasonable standard of care or misled the plaintiff into the belief that the danger had been removed). I therefore dissent.
I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Blackburn joins in this dissent.