Court Opinion

ID: 9699264
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 20:17:24.172482+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:48.291734
License: Public Domain

PAGE, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. I disagree with the court’s determination that the Kin-cades had no duty to young David Foss because “it was simply not reasonably foreseeable that David would try to climb on the bookcase.”
Other courts have noted “the known ‘propensity’ of children to roam and climb and play.” Dunbar ex rel. Blair v. NMM Glens Falls Assocs. LLC, 263 A.D.2d 865, 698 N.Y.S.2d 746, 747 (N.Y.App.Div.1999) (citation omitted); see also Orr v. First Nat’l Stores, Inc., 280 A.2d 785, 789 (Me.1971) (observing that “young children have propensities to intermeddle and to indulge impulses to play and climb”); Collentine ex rel. Collentine v. City of New York, 279 N.Y. 119, 17 N.E.2d 792, 795 (1938) (holding that in deciding the care reasonable under the circumstances, the jury was “entitled to take into consideration the well-known propensities of children to climb about and play”). As one court put it, “Surely anyone familiar with young children, especially two-year-olds, is aware of their propensity to climb.... ” Amos v. Alpha Prop. Mgmt., 73 Cal.App.4th 895, 87 Cal.Rptr.2d 34, 39 (Cal.Ct.App.1999). As a father and now a grandfather, I must agree with these courts. In addition to courts that have recognized children’s propensity to climb, any number of Internet websites discuss child safety and the propensity for children to climb. See, e.g., Household Safety: Preventing Injuries From Falling, Climbing, and Grabbing, http://kidshealth.org/parent/firstaid_safe/ home/safety_falls.html (last visited May 7, 2009). Given the known propensity of young children to climb, the court is simply wrong in holding that it was not “reasonably forseeable that David would try to climb on the bookcase.”
I would hold that it is reasonably foreseeable as a matter of law that David might attempt to climb the bookcase, and I would reverse the lower courts and remand this matter to the district court for further proceedings.
I do, however, agree with the court’s decision not to extend the rationale of Sirek ex rel. Beaumaster v. Department of Natural Resources, 496 N.W.2d 807 (Minn.1993), to this case. I also agree with the court that the Kincades’ disposal of the bookcase does not warrant sanctions. Although I would hold that it was foreseeable that David would attempt to climb the bookcase, the disposal of the bookcase is not significant to Mr. Foss’s case, since the Kincades admit they knew the bookcase was susceptible to being tipped over.