The duty owed by an owner or occupier of land to a person entering the property depends upon the status of such person; that is, whether the person entering the property is a trespasser, licensee or invitee. The status of the injured person is critical in determining whether a cause of action exists against the owner or occupier of the land where the injury was caused.
Trespassers are those who enter or remain upon land in the possession of another without a right to enter or remain on the property. Trespassers are divided into two types: adult and infant trespassers (children). As to adult trespassers, the owner or occupier of land owes a duty to a trespasser only to refrain from acts that wilfully injure the trespasser. A possessor of land may take steps to repel a trespasser, but cannot arrange the premises as to cause death or serious bodily injury to a trespasser. This standard is modified as to infant trespassers. Because children may lack sufficient discretion for their own safety, a landowner or occupier will be liable for physical harm to a child trespassing on the premises if all of the following elements are demonstrated: (a) the possessor of the property knows or has reason to know that children are likely to trespass; and (b) the possessor of the property knows or has reason to know that the condition of the property involves an unreasonable risk of death or serious bodily harm to such children; and (c) the children because of their youth do not discovery the condition or do not realize the risk involved by trespassing or intermeddling with the condition; and (d) the utility to the possessor of maintaining the condition and the burden of eliminating the danger are slight; and (e) the possessor of the property fails to exercise reasonable care to eliminate the danger or otherwise protect the children.
A licensee is a person who has the right to enter or remain on the premises by the consent of the possessor. A landowner or occupier has a duty to licensees to abstain from willfully injurious acts. If the owner or occupier of the land knows of a hazardous condition on the premises and could reasonably anticipate that the licensee would not observe and avoid such condition, then the owner or occupier must either give warning or make the condition reasonably safe. A social guest, for example, would be considered a licensee. A host has no obligation to make his home safer for a guest than for himself and is not required to inspect his premises to discover defects that might exist.
An invitee is one who is permitted to enter or remain on premises for a purpose of the owner or occupier of the premises. An invitee enters the premises by express or implied invitation. The owner or occupier of premises is under a duty to exercise ordinary care to render the premises reasonably safe for the purposes embraced in the invitation; such as, an invitation to the public to enter the premises for the purpose of conducting business. The owner of premises extending such an invitation must take such steps as are reasonable and prudent to correct or give warning of dangerous conditions known to the owner/occupier and of dangerous conditions that by the exercise of reasonable care could be discovered. Thus, a landowner or occupier must make reasonable inspections of his property to discover potential hazards to invitees.
The attorneys of Ginarte, Gonzalez & Winograd, LLP are well-versed in the law of premises liability and have extensive experience handling these types of cases for the firm’s clients.