Court Opinion

ID: 9770534
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 16:08:34.86463+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:18.154004
License: Public Domain

LEIBSON, Justice,
dissenting.
Respectfully, I dissent.
Under the old common rule the landlord owed no duty of care to the tenant regarding the condition of the leased premises. Caveat emptor applied, and the tenant took the premises as he found them. KRS 227.400 modifies the common law rule by imposing a statutory duty, stating:
1) No owner shall fail to furnish and use reasonable adequate protection and safeguards against fire loss, or fail to adopt and use processes and methods reasonably adequate to render such places safe from fire loss.
2) No owner shall require or allow the public ... to go into or be in any property *117under his control which is not reasonably safe from the fire loss.
The Court of Appeals erred in affirming summary judgment under the old common law rule rather than the duty imposed by statute. The plaintiffs evidence is that the leased dwelling was a fire trap lacking both smoke detectors and fireplace screens that a jury would find reasonably necessary to comply with the statutory requirement stated in KRS 227.400. Certainly, there is sufficient evidence supporting this position to withstand summary judgment.
Appellee contends the exclusion in the Fire Code for single family dwellings excuses nonperformance of the duty imposed by KRS 227.400. This is untenable. KRS 227.300 authorizes the Commissioner to “promulgate reasonable rules and regulations based on good engineering practice and principles as embodied in recognized standards of fire prevention and protection,” but there is no evidence that there is any rational basis for exempting single family dwellings from what is otherwise required by “recognized standards of fire prevention and protection.” There is no rational basis to distinguish between the single family residence and the duplex next door, and nothing offered to support appellee’s claim that multiple family dwellings involve a “greater degree of risk.” On the contrary, the National Fire Protection Association suggests otherwise.
A regulation enacted to carry out a statutory purpose has the force of law, but the single family dwelling exclusion does not qualify. Reasonably construed, KRS 227.300 permits regulations to supplement the earlier statute, KRS 227.400, rather than to restrict it.
I would reverse the Court of Appeals and the trial court’s summary judgment and remand for further proceedings.
Turning to the supplemental issues regarding damages:
1) Kentucky’s wrongful death statute is not a survivor’s loss statute, so it does not provide a basis for extending a right of recovery for minor children for loss of parental care. See Department of Education v. Blevins, Ky., 707 S.W.2d 782 (1986).
2) As to the personal injury claim of Phillip Wade Adams, the surviving child’s loss of the enjoyment of life (so-called “hedonic damages”), in Kentucky this loss is recoverable within the concept of “mental suffering,” and may be so argued to the jury. There is, however, no reason why the right to such damages should not be spelled out in the instructions, so the jury will understand there is no argument about the plaintiffs right to recover such damages where there is liability. This right can and should be included by adding to the instructions which provide for an award for “mental suffering” the language “... mental suffering, which includes loss of the enjoyment of living.” To include loss of the enjoyment of life as an additional element of damages would be to invite double recovery.
Therefore, I would uphold summary judgment excluding additional damages for loss of parental care and loss of the enjoyment of life.
STUMBO, J., joins.