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Bath Excavating & Construction Co. v. Wills3/15/1993
694 P.2d at 438; Hawkins, 727 S.W.2d at 400; Flowers, 520 A.2d at 368; Kreski, 415 N.W.2d at 186-89; Krause, 787 S.W.2d at 712; Steelman, 634 P.2d at 667; Rosa, 583 A.2d at 1131-33; Santangelo, 521 N.E. 2d at 771-72; Mignone, 556 A.2d at 39.
At least one court has recognized that the rule is premised on common sense, insofar as the rule prevents public safety officers from recovering damages in tort for performance of their jobs, which they were already obligated to perform and for which they previously received compensation. Kreski, 415 N.W.2d at 183 ("The fireman's rule is based on practicability and common sense. . . . [The rule states] that a fire fighter or police officer may not recover damages from a private party for negligence in the creation of the reason for the safety officer's presence.").
In determining whether a contemporary version of the rule should be adopted and operate to bar a public safety worker from filing suit, many courts have examined both the nature of the service provided by the public safety officer's work, and the relationship of the officer to the public. Thomas, 811 at 824-25 (finding that fire fighters provide a service that entails confronting danger, and that the public relies on them to do so); Winn, 777 P.2d 722 at 725 (relying on Kreski, 415 N.W.2d at 186-87); Flowers, 520 A.2d at 368; Kreski, 415 N.W.2d at 186 ("The policy arguments for adopting a fireman's rule stem from the nature of the service provided by fire fighters and police officers, as well as the relationship between these safety officers and the public they are employed to protect."). In concluding that a contemporary version of the rule applied to fire fighters and police officers, the Missouri Supreme Court stated that the rule applied to "the official whose primary public duty is to confront danger." Krause, 787 S.W.2d at 713.
The public policy rationales discussed provide a useful backdrop against which to evaluate whether Colorado should endorse a contemporary version of the public safety worker rule. Analysis of public policy rationales and the factors upon which courts determine the existence of a duty dictates that a public safety worker rule should be adopted in the present case.
B.
Colorado Law
As the majority notes, in 1910, this court classified fire fighters as licensees when a surviving spouse filed an action against a building occupant after the deceased spouse, a fire fighter, sustained fatal injuries while responding to an alarm in the building. Lunt v. Post Printing and Publishing Co., 48 Colo. 316, 110 P. 203 (1910). This court recognized that "the firemen are on the premises, not in discharge of any private duty due from them to the occupant, but of a public duty which they owe to the public." Id. at 325, 110 P. at 206. This court concluded that the deceased fire fighter entered the building "in the character of a licensee, under circumstances and conditions requiring [the fire fighter's] presence in the discharge of his duties." Id. at 329, 110 P. at 207. This court sustained the dismissal of the complaint. As the majority notes, this court abolished common-law classifications of entrants on land of another in Mile High Fence Co. v. Radovich, 175 Colo. 537, 489 P.2d 308 (1971). We premised our rejection of the common-law categories of trespasser, licensee, and invitee in part on the fact that "rigid adherence to common law classifications results in the resolution, in many instances, of the owner's liability as a matter of law." Id. at 543, 489 P.2d at 312. We reaffirmed our rejection of the commonlaw categories in
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