Court Opinion

ID: 9661584
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 22:43:33.257483+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:52:45.694885
License: Public Domain

SMITH, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. The trial court, the Court of Civil Appeals and this Court have denied a trial by jury of the issues drawn by the pleadings and the evidence. The plaintiffs’ pleadings present issues of negligence in that it is alleged that Mrs. Seideneck went to defendants’ showroom as a business invitee and while shopping in the defendants’ place of business, she was tripped by a rug with woven holes and that this dangerous rug with holes therein was the proximate cause of the injuries sustained. Plaintiffs specifically alleged that the injuries and resulting damages were “proximately caused by defendants’ failure to make defendants’ showroom reasonably safe for business invitees such as plaintiff, Margaret Seideneck. Defendants failed to use the legally required degree of care in the following particulars: (1) Use by defendants of an inherently dangerously constructed rug; (2) Defendants’ dangerous placement of said rug; (3) Defendants’ failure to warn plaintiff of the dangerous rug and its dangerous placement. Plaintiff, Margaret Seideneck, exercised due care for her own safety under the circumstances at the time in question, but nevertheless was unaware of the dangerous condition described above, which caused her injury and resulting damages.”
The defendants answered with a general denial and a plea that Mrs. Seideneck was herself guilty of acts of negligence which were a proximate cause of her injuries in the following particulars: “(a) She failed to keep a proper lookout; (b) She stepped backwards without looking. Each of the above acts of omission and commission were negligent and either singly or collectively were a proximate cause of plaintiffs’ damages.”
I accept the law in Halepeska v. Callihan Interests, Inc., 371 S.W.2d 368, 378 (Tex.Sup.1963) and Robert E. McKee, *756General Contractor v. Patterson, 153 Tex. 517, 271 S.W.2d 391, 393 (1954) but it is my position that those cases are not controlling here. A jury would be warranted in finding that the defendants knew of the condition they had deliberately created and a reasonably prudent person should have known that placing a rug with woven holes about one inch in diameter around its outer edge under a display table would probably result in the type of accident as described in this case. The defendants were in a position to know the condition of the rug. The injured plaintiff was not. There is nothing in this record to cause the invitee to realize that the asphalt tile floor which she had traversed from the point of entrance would suddenly change to a dangerously looped rug which when a person moving around the table to view the articles thereon would be caused to fall as a result of the heel of her shoe catching in one of the woven loops. The defendants say in their pleadings that the injured plaintiff stepped backward without looking. It is my view that an inference could be properly drawn that Mrs. Seideneck was standing with her side next to the table when she stepped backwards. The evidence most favorable to the plaintiffs’ version as to how the fall and subsequent injuries occurred shows and the jury, if allowed, could have found that Mrs. Seide-neck entered the defendants’ showroom, approached the table in the corner of the room and that as she was viewing the articles thereon, the heel of her shoe hung in one of those holes, then in stepping backward, the rug being held stationary by the table, she was thrown to the floor. To say the least, Mrs. Seideneck had the right to assume that the premises were safe for her use. Blanks v. Southland Hotel, Inc., 149 Tex. 139, 229 S.W.2d 357, 360 (1950). Mrs. Seideneck was not under a duty to inspect the premises surrounding the table under all the surrounding circumstances. Should she be compelled to look under the table, discover the woven holes about the size of a shoe heel in the rug, and then inform the defendants that she would not view the Christmas tree and other articles on the table until the dangerous condition which they had created was removed? It was the duty of the defendants to keep their premises in a reasonably safe condition for use by their invitees.
The rule was declared in J. Weingarten, Inc. v. Brockman, 135 S.W.2d 698 (Tex. Comm.1940), wherein the Court said:
“The issue of whether or not given acts constitute negligence is essentially a jury question. The facts of each case must be given independent consideration, and seldom are the facts of any two cases so identical as that the decision in one could be held to be authority for a like decision in the other. Examining the facts in the case before us, we are of the opinion that an issue is presented on the negligence of plaintiff in error in failing to maintain the premises in a reasonably safe condition. Jurors might .conclude that the slight offset on the wide concrete area was deceptive and dangerous. The record does not disclose why such a slight offset should have been maintained or what purpose it served. Plaintiff in error invited the public, including Mrs. Brockman, to come through the north entrance of this store, thereby impliedly representing that it was safe for them to do so. If it was unsafe, the jury might have concluded that plaintiff in error should have made it safe, or, if that could not be done practically, should have discontinued the use of that entrance altogether. We cannot hold that this slight offset was so obvious as to exonerate plaintiff in error of all negligence as a matter of law.”
I respectfully submit that in determining whether or not the trial court properly granted an instructed verdict, the rule should be invoked which requires the appellate courts to view only the evidence (and all reasonable inferences to be drawn therefrom) most favorable to plaintiffs cause of action and discard all contrary evidence and inferences. See Triangle *757Motors v. Richmond, 152 Tex. 354, 258 S.W.2d 60 (1953); White v. White, 141 Tex. 328, 172 S.W.2d 295 (1943).
The judgments of the courts below should be reversed and the cause remanded to the trial court for a new trial on its merits.
REAVLEY, J., joins in this dissent.