Court Opinion

ID: 9550316
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:33:57.116976+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:21:23.441808
License: Public Domain

HUNTLEY, Justice,
dissenting.
I must respectfully dissent from the majority opinion which, in effect, establishes a rule of law in Idaho that the owner of a premises, such as a hospital, need not sand nor take any other precautions when ice is known to have been formed on an inclined walkway entrance, when the owner of the premises is well aware that it is the likely and probable entrance to be utilized by the public invited to come upon its premises.
As the majority notes, in Keller v. Holiday Inns, Inc., 107 Idaho 593, 691 P.2d 1208 (1984), this Court held that the landowner “[who] has reason to expect that the employee will proceed to encounter the dangerous condition in order to keep his or her job ... is not relieved of the duty of reasonable care which the landowner owes to the employee/invitee for his or her protection even though the dangerous condition is known and obvious to the employee.” 107 Idaho at 595, 691 P.2d 1208.
The facts in this case are not substantially different than those in Keller, supra, and this case should be decided on the same theoretical basis. The hospital was open for business, and the management was fully aware that staff, patients and invitees would be utilizing this entrance to the hospital, whether or not it was dangerous.
A fact not mentioned in the majority opinion which makes this ruling even more *256egregious, is that the inclined walkway where the plaintiff fell was actually the blue-painted, handicapped person access. It defies belief that this Court would pronounce a rule of law that there is not even a jury question as to whether premises are in a “reasonably safe condition” where the premises in question consists of an access for handicapped people which is not even sanded, and where the hospital is fully aware of build-up of ice.
I would apply the reasoning of Keller to this case and remand for a jury trial on the issue of whether this handicapped-access walkway was reasonably maintained under the circumstances.
BISTLINE, J., concurs.