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Hudson v. Courtesy Motors9/13/2001
in almost all other areas of tort liability, and premises liability should be no different. " man's life or limb should not differ based on whether he is on the property for business or for a social visit." Hall v. Cagle, 773 So.2d at 93 (McRae, J., concurring). What is even more confusing is when a landowner is driving his car on his property and negligently wrecks his vehicle and injures his passenger, we do not apply the invitee or licensee test. It is the reasonable person standard.
. Recognizing the arbitrary unfairness of the common law system of fault allocation, Mississippi was one of the first states to abolish contributory negligence as a complete bar to recovery and replaced it with a pure comparative negligence standard. Tharp v. Bunge Corp., 641 So.2d 20, 23 (Miss. 1994). We should now apply our comparative negligence rule to premises liability cases, and replace the invitee/licensee distinctions with a reasonable person standard. This would be the most fair way to allocate fault between entrant plaintiffs and defendant landowners.
. Interestingly, if Mayvalan Hudson were on CMI's property to test- drive a car and a CMI employee negligently caused an accident while Hudson was in the car, the invitee/licensee distinction would not apply. Tharp sets forth the proper legal setting in which to analyze negligence cases, including premises liability, and that is the standard of a care that a reasonable person would employ under the circumstances.
. In addition, whether Hudson was an invitee or a licensee is a jury question. As the majority correctly notes, whether a plaintiff is an invitee or licensee is a jury question. Saucier v. Biloxi Reg'l Med. Ctr., 708 So.2d 1351, 1355 (Miss. 1998). When no facts are disputed, however, the question becomes one of law. Id. In Clark, we defined a business invitee as one who "is invited to enter or remain on land for a purpose directly or indirectly connected with business dealings with the possessor of the land." 538 So.2d at 763. Summary judgment was improper in this case because there exists a genuine issue of material fact regarding whether Hudson was on CMI's property for a purpose directly or indirectly connected with CMI's used car business.
. We are now presented with another opportunity to abandon the antiquated invitee/licensee distinctions in favor of adopting the standard of a reasonable person acting under like circumstances, and we should not fail to take it. A reasonable person standard would be easier to apply and less arbitrary in its results. It represents the evolution of our law, and if we fail to embrace it, we will remain mired in the past in the area of premises liability. Furthermore, whether Hudson was an invitee or a licensee is a question for the jury to resolve. The trial court therefore erred in granting summary judgment in favor of CMI. Accordingly, I dissent.
DIAZ AND EASLEY, JJ., JOIN THIS OPINION.
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