 |
 |
to fill out a simple form to connect to Personal Injury Lawyers in your area.
|
|
|
|
|
Murray v. West Building Materials of Georgia5/5/2000
ndant establishes negligence on the part of the plaintiff -- i.e., that the plaintiff intentionally and unreasonably exposed self to a hazard of which the plaintiff knew or, in the exercise of ordinary care, should have known." Robinson, supra, 268 Ga. at 749. Moreover, our analysis of this issue must be guided by Robinson's directive that "the 'routine' issues of premises liability, i.e., the negligence of the defendant and the plaintiff, and the plaintiff's lack of ordinary care for personal safety[,] are generally not susceptible of summary adjudication." Id. at 748.
West claims that Murray's negligence is established as a matter of law by the fact that she had previously negotiated the steps without difficulty. West relies on pre-Robinson cases holding that "when a person has successfully negotiated an allegedly dangerous condition on a previous occasion, that person is presumed to have knowledge of that condition and cannot recover for a subsequent injury resulting therefrom." See, e.g., Dickman v. South City Management, 229 Ga. App. 289, 291 (494 SE2d 64) (1997) (physical precedent only). However, this rule has no application in the present case. The danger allegedly posed by the steps resulted from a combination of the steps' lack of uniformity, their excessive combined height and width, and the too-short handrail compounding the first two irregularities. We cannot say "as a matter of law that an individual using the [steps] would have appreciated the danger posed by the combination of these elements." Flournoy v. Hospital Auth. of Houston County, supra, 232 Ga. App. at 793; see also Robinson v. Western International Hotels Co., 170 Ga. App. 812 (318 SE2d 235) (1984).
Similarly, in Aggeles v. Theater of the Stars, Inc., 235 Ga. App. 57, 58 (507 SE2d 856) (1998) (physical precedent only), we held the plaintiff did not have actual knowledge of the hazard posed by a handrail when she had previously ascended the staircase and fell while descending the staircase.
West cites Mechanical Equipment Co. v. Hoose, 241 Ga. App. 412 ( SE2d ) (1999) and Hannah v. Hampton Auto Parts, Inc., 234 Ga. App. 392 (506 SE2d 910) (1998) to support its argument that it was entitled to summary judgment here. However, those cases are distinguishable, as both plaintiffs had successfully traversed many times the steps on which they fell. Murray, on the other hand, had only ascended West's steps one time, and fell on her first descent.
According, the trial court erred in granting summary judgment to West.
Judgment reversed.
Eldridge, J, concurs.
Blackburn, P. J., concurs in the judgment only.
|