Court Opinion

ID: 9758614
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 23:38:08.248841+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:53.434889
License: Public Domain

PRICE, Judge,
dissenting:
On April 25, 1974, appellee Dorothy Calhoun visited her husband at appellant Jersey Shore Hospital. She was accompanied by the Reverend Robert Brest. While walking in the hallway after leaving her husband’s room, Mrs. Calhoun fell and injured her back and right leg. A jury awarded her a verdict of $12,000.00 against the appellant. I would reverse the judgment of the lower court because the evidence is insufficient to establish a cause of action for negligence against the hospital.
Mrs. Ruth Muhtler, appellee’s next door neighbor, testified that on April 25, 1974, she visited her daughter and Clarence Groover, both patients at Jersey Shore Hospital. At approximately 2:00 p.m., she entered Mr. Groover’s room. As she did so, she noticed that an employee of the hospital was “wet-mopping” the hallway, and she prophetically remarked to Mr. Groover that “it would be a wonder if someone didn’t fall.” Minutes later, Mrs. Muhtler heard a commotion in the hallway. She left Mr. Groover’s room and observed Mrs. Calhoun being helped from the floor where she had fallen. Mrs. Muhtler had observed no signs warning of the condition of the floor.
Reverend Brest testified that as he and Mrs. Calhoun left Mr. Calhoun's room, Mrs. Calhoun fell. He did not know the cause of her fall. Mr. Brest testified that the floor was shiny and very smooth, and that,
*575“I wouldn’t walk normally on a floor like that, as I would walk on other floors because it gave to me the appearance that it — you just wouldn’t walk on it normally.”1
Mrs. Calhoun also testified to the smooth and shiny condition of the floor. She did not testify that the floor was slippery, nor did she testify to the cause of her fall.
After a motion for compulsory non-suit was denied, appellant’s case was presented. Testimony was elicited that the hospital floor was made of vinyl asbestos. It was maintained at the time of Mrs. Calhoun’s injury with a product called “Vintage,” which was an institutional waxing agent and cleaner with non-skid properties. A floor maintained with Vintage or a similar product, even when wet, would be less slippery than an unmaintained floor.
Rosalie Eckenstine, the housekeeper responsible for cleaning and maintaining the floor upon which Mrs. Calhoun fell, testified that she had no independent recollection of the events of April 25, 1974. However, she testified that it was the hospital’s strict policy, from which she never deviated, to erect cautionary signs in a hallway that was being cleaned.
Appellee’s theory of liability in this case is that appellant negligently failed to warn her of an unreasonably dangerous condition or to put the premises in a reasonably safe condition. See Pushnik v. Winky’s Drive In Restaurants, Inc., 242 Pa.Super. 323, 363 A.2d 1291 (1976); Restatement (Second) of Torts § 343 (1965). Recently, the supreme court, in Gilbert v. Korvette’s Inc., 457 Pa. 602, 327 A.2d 94 (1974), clarified the law in Pennsylvania which has long permitted the elements of a cause of action for negligence to be established by circumstantial evidence. Cuthbert v. Philadelphia, 417 Pa. 610, 209 A.2d 261 (1965); Smith v. Bell Telephone Co., 397 Pa. 134, 153 A.2d 477 (1959); Paul v. Hess Bros., Inc., 226 Pa.Super. 92, 312 A.2d 65 (1973).
In building a framework with which to analyze the issues in this case, it is useful preliminarily to examine and distin*576guish a parallel situation. In products liability cases, it is well established that evidence of a malfunction is circumstantial proof of a defect. Cornell Drilling Co. v. Ford Motor Co., 241 Pa.Super. 129, 359 A.2d 822 (1976). This is because an inanimate product does not normally malfunction in the absence of a defect. MacDougall v. Ford Motor Co., 214 Pa.Super. 384, 257 A.2d 676 (1969). However, this rule of evidence does not permit an accident to be circumstantial proof of negligence. Unfortunately, accidents do happen.
Therefore, Pennsylvania courts have properly required more than evidence of an accident to prove negligence. “[T]he mere happening of an accident is no evidence of negligence and does not raise a presumption of negligence.” Winkler v. Seven Springs Farm, Inc., 240 Pa.Super. 641, 647, 359 A.2d 440, 443 (1976). The event must be “of a kind which ordinarily does not occur in the absence of negligence.” Restatement (Second) of Torts § 328 D.(l)(a) (1965). See also Amon v. Shemaka, 419 Pa. 314, 214 A.2d 238 (1965).
To prove causation by circumstantial evidence, the plaintiff need not “prove with mathematical exactness that the accident could only have been caused in one manner to the exclusion of all other possibilities . . . but he must eliminate those other causes, if any, as were fairly suggested by the evidence . . . .” Cuthbert v. Philadelphia, 417 Pa. at 614-15, 209 A.2d at 263-64. “[A] jury cannot be permitted to return a verdict based on speculation and not supported by adequate evidence or reasonable inferences.” Winkler v. Seven Springs Farm, Inc., 240 Pa.Super. at 646, 359 A.2d at 442. “[Ojther responsible causes, including the conduct of the plaintiff and third persons . . . [must be] sufficiently eliminated by the evidence.” Restatement (Second) of Torts § 328 D.(l)(b) (1965).
In this case, the only evidence of negligence and causation is the fact of appellee’s fall combined with Mrs. Muhtler’s testimony that the floor was wet before appellee fell. The jury could reasonably have inferred that the floor was wet when appellee fell. However, evidence that a floor was wet, without more, is not evidence of negligence. Burton v. Horn *577& Hardart Baking Co., 371 Pa. 60, 88 A.2d 873 (1952). Therefore, the jury could not infer negligence unless appellee adduced evidence that the floor was unreasonably dangerous. However, there is no evidence in this case that the floor was dangerous. Not one of appellee’s witnesses testified that the floor was slippery.
It might be contended that the fact of appellee’s fall, together with evidence that the floor was wet, is evidence of the floor’s dangerous condition. This argument assumes that appellee fell because of the wet, slippery condition of the floor. However, appellee has not sufficiently, eliminated other possible explanations for the accident. People fall for many reasons. There is no evidence in this case that appellee feel because of a wet floor. Indeed, one of appellant’s witnesses testified that a floor of the type used by appellant, even when wet, is less slippery than a normal floor. To allow the jury in this case to infer that appellee’s fall was caused by a wet floor would be tantamount to allowing the jury to speculate among plausible solutions. This is impermissible. See Lenkiewicz v. Lange, 242 Pa.Super. 87, 363 A.2d 1172 (1976); Restatement (Second) of Torts § 328 D. comment on clause (a) of subsection (1) (1965).
To simplify, appellee seeks to have the jury infer that the floor was slippery because she fell; simultaneously, she seeks to have the jury infer that she fell because the floor was slippery. I do not believe that two impermissible inferences can be used as evidence in support of each other.
Because appellee failed to produce sufficient evidence to establish a cause of action for negligence against appellant, I would reverse the judgment of the lower court.

. Reverend Brest also testified that the floor was slippery. However, this testimony was subsequently stricken when Reverend Brest admitted that he had no basis for such a conclusion.