Court Opinion

ID: 9672154
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:50:01.370488+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:14.702403
License: Public Domain

HOWARD, Presiding Judge
(dissenting)-
I cannot agree with the holding of the main opinion on the question of contributory negligence of the plaintiff. In this situation, the plaintiff knew that the lights were out in the hotel. By the use of his cigarette lighter, he was able to negotiate the descent of four flights of stairs in safety. When he came through the door into the lobby area, he saw candlelight in the distance. He states that he thought he was on the lobby level. He then extinguished his cigarette lighter, put it in his pocket, picked up his bags and blithely walked forward in the dark and fell down the steps. It is obvious that plaintiff could not see where he was placing his feet. It is equally obvious that if plaintiff had used his cigarette lighter as he had been doing, he could have discovered the steps and avoided falling. I cannot say that reasonable men would differ as to the negligence of the plaintiff in extinguishing his light and walking into the darkness where he could not see where his feet would fall. We are not here faced with a claim that, plaintiff was contributorily negligent in initially attempting to descend from his room to the lobby in darkness. Rather, we must determine the legal consequences of plaintiff’s failure to use his light so as to see where he was going, as he had just done in coming down the four flights of stairs. Although the factual situation was entirely different in Boland v. Thompson, Mo.App., 142 S.W.2d 790, it is believed that the fundamental duty of plaintiff to use care for his own safety, as set out in that opinion, is applicable to plaintiff in the case at bar. It was said in Boland, 1. c. 793:
“* * * ft is the duty of a person to make reasonable use of his faculties and intelligence to discover dangers and conditions of danger to which he is or might become exposed. Reasonable use of the faculties means such use as an ordinarily prudent person would have made of them under the circumstances. When a situation suggests investigation and inspection in order that its dangers may be fully disclosed, he is under the obligation of investigating and inspecting. The presumption is that one will observe and understand all perils that a prudent and intelligent person would observe and understand, and if he neglects to observe and consequently remains in ignorance of discoverable dangers, the fault is deemed to be his own. * * *” (Emphasis supplied)
See also O’Dell v. Dean, 356 Mo. 861, 204 S.W.2d 248.
Under all the circumstances in the case at bar, it is believed that one who has the means to see where he is stepping and deliberately refuses to use such means and deliberately steps into the dark not knowing where his feet will land is negligent in so doing.
I would reverse outright.