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CRAMER v. BALCOR PROPERTY MGMT.2/7/1994
Pursuant to Rule 228, SCACR, the following questions have been certified to this Court by the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina:
Does a landlord owe a duty to a tenant to
provide security in and around a leased
premises so as to protect the tenant from
criminal activity of third parties?
If so, is the duty derived from the South
Carolina Residential Landlord-Tenant Act,
S.C. Code Ann. Section 27-40-10, et. seq.
(1991), or from common law and under what
circumstances does that duty arise?
FACTS
The deceased Genevieve Zitricki was murdered in her apartment on or about April 5, 1990. The unknown assailant entered her apartment by prying open the patio sliding glass door. The plaintiff instituted a
The defendant moved for summary judgment, asserting that there was no duty owed by the landlord to the decedent to protect her from criminal activity of a third party. As a result of that motion, the above questions were certified to this Court.
DISCUSSION
The initial question before this Court is whether a landlord has a duty to provide security to protect tenants from the criminal activity of third parties.
The plaintiff urges this Court to recognize a view of the relationship between the landlord and tenant which is analogous to that of the innkeeper and guest relationship. In so doing, the plaintiff urges the Court to adopt the corresponding duty of the landlord to protect its tenants from foreseeable criminal activity. The plaintiff asks the Court to find that those persons
The plaintiff claims that the landlord's duty is derived from common law. This conclusion is based on the assumption that the landlord/tenant relationship is analogous to innkeeper/guest and store owner/invitee relationships. The plaintiff asserts that the broader view draws little distinction between the above relationships. The plaintiff contends that the trend has been to impose a duty on innkeepers and merchants to protect their guests or invitees from foreseeable criminal activity of third parties. See Bullard v. Ehrhardt, 283 S.C. 557, 324 S.E.2d 61 (1984); Munn v. Hardee's Food System, Inc., 274 S.C. 529, 266 S.E.2d 414 (1980); and Shipes v. Piggly Wiggly St. Andrews, Inc., 269 S.C. 479, 238 S.E.2d 167 (1977). The district court in Cooke v. Allstate Management Corp., 741 F. Supp. 1205 (D.S.C. 1990) considered the same cases relied on by this appellant and rejected the argument that South Carolina courts would extend the exceptions to the general rule to recognize an affirmative duty to protect tenants from criminal conduct.
Cooke v. Allstate Management Corp. is directly on point in addressing the questions raised here. In Cooke, the intruder gained access to the tenant's apartment through a sliding glass door. The tenant alleged that the attacker was able to reach her balcony by using a ladder left nearby. The tenant in Cooke alleged that the landlord was negligent for a number of reasons, including leaving an unsecured ladder nearby. The district court decided there was a factual issue whether the landlord's ladder was used by the attacker. Thus, the defendant's motion for summary judgment was denied on the negligence claim based upon the questions surrounding use of the ladder.
The plaintiff in Cooke, as in this case, attempted to extend the duty owed by store owners and innkeepers to landlords. However, the district court found that argument unpersuasive "in light of the cautions approach the South Carolina appellate courts have taken even in those contexts." Cooke, 741 F. Supp. at 1213. The district court was not convinced that the assumption was sound that
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