Court Opinion

ID: 9594188
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:27:51.199868+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:59:28.316729
License: Public Domain

*408Boyle, J.
(concurring in part and dissenting in part). I agree that the initial question is one of duty, and I further agree with Justice Kelly’s result in Mason and in Goodman. I write separately because I do not agree with Justice Kelly’s rationale in Goodman, which appears to extend a merchant’s duty to protect an invitee against criminal acts of third parties. Because a tavern keeper has a common-law duty to supervise the premises by using reasonable care to protect patrons from foreseeable injury, Manuel v Weitzman, 386 Mich 157; 191 NW2d 474 (1971), Millross v Plum Hollow Golf Club, 429 Mich 178; 413 NW2d 17 (1987), and Jackson v PMK Corp, 430 Mich 262, 276-277; 422 NW2d 657 (1988), in my view it is unnecessary and unwise to either explicitly or implicitly opine in this case regarding a merchant’s general duty of care toward invitees. Thus, while I disagree with Justice Weaver’s implicit suggestion that Manuel v Weitzman has been overruled or limited by this Court, I agree with her concern that the majority has impermissibly expanded the general rule of nonliability for criminal acts of third parties.
Williams v Cunningham Drug Stores, Inc, 429 Mich 495, 499; 418 NW2d 381 (1988), and Scott v Harper Recreation, Inc, 444 Mich 441, 448; 506 NW2d 857 (1993), involved the issue of a merchant’s general duty to an invitee.1 As the majority seems to acknowledge by citing Manuel v Weitzman, neither case purported to overrule or limit the Court’s previous holdings regarding the tavern owner’s duty to protect a patron from injury by another. The fact that this *409Court has not imposed on merchants a general duty to protect an invitee from the intentional criminal acts of another arising from prior crimes in the area or on the premises, does not abrogate the tavern owner’s common-law duty to take reasonable care to protect parties where it knew or had reason to know that a crime was going to occur.2 Given that the Court has long recognized that a tavern presents an exception to the rule that there is no duty to protect invitees against intentional criminal acts of third persons, the majority’s analysis of duty is unwarranted.
Given that a duty existed, and that there was conflicting evidence whether the defendant acted reasonably in responding to the disturbance, it cannot be said that the verdict of the jury was not supported by the evidence. Gorby v Yeomans, 4 Mich App 339; 144 NW2d 837 (1966). This case is an inappropriate vehicle for consideration of whether, and to what extent, a merchant has a general duty to anticipate the criminal acts of third parties. Thus, to the extent that the rationale suggests any modification of the decisions in Williams and Harper Recreation, I respectfully dissent.

 Homant & Kennedy, Landholder responsibility for third party crimes in Michigan: An analysis of underlying legal values, 27 U Tol L R 115 (1995).

 Anno: Tavernkeeper’s liability to patron for third person’s assault, 43 ALR4th 281.