Court Opinion

ID: 9659009
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 21:26:32.374728+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:02.966673
License: Public Domain

Otis, Justice
(dissenting).
In my opinion, the trial court was correct when it initially directed verdicts for defendant. For that reason I would reverse.
Plaintiff was within 2 weeks of his 14th birthday at the time of this accident. He had been swimming since he was 8 or 9 years of age. During the summer months prior to his injury he had been in the water “almost every day.” In reaching the platform which was specifically designed and used for diving, he passed within 20 or 30 feet of the spot where he was hurt. Again, upon his return from the platform to the shore, he was obliged to go under the rope stretched between the ends of the two docks at a point where the water was 2Vz feet deep. Thus, on two separate occasions he had traversed the line where he subsequently dived, knowing, as he admitted, that the purpose of the rope enclosure was to indicate “shallow water inside.” He acknowledged an awareness of the danger inherent in diving where he was unaware of the depth. He had seen no other swimmers dive from the dock and was neither invited nor lulled into doing so himself. The presence of the platform intended for diving and plaintiff’s use of it for an hour during the morning clearly negated any suggestion that he was lured to any other area for that purpose.
*219I cannot agree that a normal adolescent boy with knowledge of the facts has no responsibility to avoid hazards which have been made obvious to him by his own use of the premises, or that in the absence of such knowledge he had no duty to determine the potential danger before plunging from the dock. Pinehurst Co. v. Phelps, 163 Md. 68,160 A. 736; Stungis v. Wavecrest Realty Co. 124 Neb. 769, 248 N. W. 78; Webb v. Thomas, 133 Colo. 458, 296 P. (2d) 1036; Caruso v. Aetna Ins. Co. (La. App.) 186 So. (2d) 851; 4 Am. Jur. (2d) Amusements and Exhibitions, § 84; Annotation, 1 A. L. R. (3d) 963.