Court Opinion

ID: 9849261
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:37:20.642026+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:19:11.672708
License: Public Domain

Pope, Judge,
concurring specially.
I concur in the majority’s affirmance of the judgment of the trial court denying appellants’ motion to strike and motion for summary judgment. Nevertheless, like the dissent, I believe we must address the merits of the trial court’s evidentiary ruling regarding the seventeen prior criminal incidents. Appellants summarized to the trial court the nature of this evidence and argued that all of it was inadmissible as irrelevant and that the court should exclude it from the body of pleadings and papers filed in the case when it determined whether appellant was entitled to summary judgment. The trial court rejected this argument and, for the reasons set forth below, properly so. Thus, this is not a matter that can be deferred because appellants wanted the evidence excluded now, for purposes of summary judgment. It was not a motion in limine in anticipation of trial. Neither the. trial court nor we are ruling on that advanced aspect of the case. We simply have to decide whether the court was correct in taking all this evidence into account in denying summary judgment to appellants.
This case involves an application of the “prior similar incidents” rule. The prior similar incidents in this case are seventeen crimes involving unauthorized entries into apartments in the subject apartment complex during the three years immediately preceding the crime committed upon appellee. Of these seventeen crimes, the dissent would admit evidence of only two — those in which the entries were made through the sliding glass door. I believe this holding is a too narrow application of the prior similar incidents rule.
The particular issue here is whether appellants had reasonable grounds for apprehending that a crime such as the one in this case would be committed. See Warner v. Arnold, 133 Ga. App. 174 (2) (210 SE2d 350) (1974). That is, this case turns on whether the criminal actions of an unknown assailant were or should have been foreseeable to appellants. “ ‘The test is what is reasonable in all the circumstances.’” Warner v. Arnold, supra at 178. “[Liability does not depend upon anticipating the particular injury or that a particular person would be injured. [Cits.] It is enough that by ordinary prudence [appellants] could have foreseen that some injury or injurious consequence might have been anticipated from the [alleged negligent] act. [Cits.]” Cain v. Vontz, 703 F2d 1279, 1283 (11th Cir. 1983). *682“Where evidence of a prior similar [incident] tends to show condition and knowledge of that condition, the evidence is admissible. [Cits.] All that is required is that the prior [incident] be sufficient to attract the owner’s attention to the dangerous condition which resulted in the litigated [incident]. [Cit.]” Pembrook Mgt. v. Cossaboon, 157 Ga. App. 675, 677 (278 SE2d 100) (1981). In my view, evidence of all seventeen prior crimes in this case is admissible, not to show negligence on the part of appellants, but to show that appellants had knowledge of a dangerous situation, viz, unauthorized entries into apartments in the complex over a long period of time. That some of these unauthorized entries occurred on the first floor rather than on the second floor (where appellee’s apartment was located) or that some entries were made through windows or through the front door rather than through the sliding glass door are circumstances affecting the weight of this evidence, not its admissibility. Accord Shadowood Assoc. v. Kirk, 170 Ga. App. 209 (2) (316 SE2d 487) (1984); Trentacost v. Brussel, 412 A2d 436, 439-41 (N.J. 1980); Kline v. 1500 Mass. Ave. Apt. Corp., 439 F2d 477, 480-85 (D.C. Cir. 1970). See also Isaacs v. Huntington Memorial Hosp., 695 P2d 653 (Cal. 1985); Ramsay v. Morrissette, 252 A2d 509 (U.S. App. D.C. 1969).
I am authorized to state that Judge Beasley joins in this special concurrence.