Articles Posted in Premises Liability

In East El Paso Physicians Medical Center, LLC v. Olivia Vargas, an 81-year-old plaintiff who used a walker claimed she was injured when she went to a hospital facility. As she left the building, the automatic doors closed on her walker, and she fell and suffered a shoulder injury. She sued the hospital, arguing that the hospital had failed to correct a dangerous condition, failed to warn her about the dangerous condition, and failed to set and enforce appropriate safety standards.

The hospital moved to dismiss. It argued that the claim was a health care liability claim under the Texas Medical Liability Act (“the Act”). Under the Act, the plaintiff had to submit an expert report showing causation within 120 days of filing a health care liability claim. The hospital argued the plaintiff’s failure to file an expert report required that her case be dismissed. The trial court denied the motion to dismiss. The hospital appealed.

The hospital argued that the trial court had erred in denying its motion because the plaintiff’s allegations related to state regulations controlling hospital construction. It further argued that the plaintiff had not filed an ordinary premises liability claim, but a claim based on the standards that a hospital had to meet to offer health care services in Texas. The appellate court found that this argument didn’t sufficiently distinguish between the current case and other premises liability cases to bring the plaintiff’s claim within the requirements of the Act. Continue reading →

In the recent ruling in City of Diboll, Texas v. Louie Lawson, a Texas appellate court considered a case in which a Texas city claimed the recreational use statute applied to the plaintiff’s claim and that it was not grossly negligent under the statute. The case arose when a woman went to a city park to watch her granddaughter’s softball game. When leaving the park, she tripped on a four-inch hollow pipe poking up from the center of the walkway on park grounds. It would usually act as a receptacle for a pole and create a barrier that prevented cars from entering the park. However, since the pole wasn’t in place, she tripped, fell, and suffered serious injuries.

The plaintiff sued the city for a premises defect. She died for unrelated reasons, but the personal representative of her estate substituted as the plaintiff. The city filed a plea to the jurisdiction and moved for summary judgment, which was denied. Accordingly, it appealed.

On appeal, the City argued that the plaintiff had been engaged in recreation under the recreational use statute, and so the plaintiff had to plead and prove the City acted with gross negligence. It further argued that the plaintiff had not pled it was grossly negligent, and the evidence showed it was not grossly negligent. Continue reading →

In a 2011 premises liability case, two sisters appealed a summary judgment in favor of Little Caesar’s Pizza. The case arose when the sisters were in a restaurant when an armed robbery occurred. Two masked robbers came into the pizzeria, brandished their guns, and threatened the people in the restaurant. The robbers were wearing restaurant uniforms. A robber shot one of the women (Viera) when she and her sister left through the back door, and her sister (Estrada) saw the shooting.

The report showed that the robbers shot at the store managers. They ordered people to the back of the pizzeria and told the customers to run. Several customers, including the sisters, ran out of the open back door. Estrada left before Viera and when she looked back, she saw a gunman shoot three times at her sister. When the police investigated, they found the shooting was an inside job conducted with the help of a restaurant worker who left the back door open.

The sisters sued for negligent security. They claimed that the pizzeria failed to offer adequate security and that it was foreseeable an assault would happen on the property. They sought personal injury damages based on physical injuries, as well as mental anguish and PTSD. The pizzeria moved for summary judgment, arguing that the shooting happened outside the restaurant, there was no duty owed to the sisters, no evidence of causation, no evidence of foreseeability, and alternatively that the claims were barred by the statute of limitations.

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One year after a Dallas woman tragically fell to her death at a Six Flags amusement park in Arlington, the legal issues are far from over.

The accident occurred on the evening of July 19, 2013, when 52-year old Rosa Esparza fell 75 feet from where she had been sitting, behind her daughter and son-in-law, on one of the thrill rides. Prior to this, Esparza was allegedly upside down in her seat and holding on for “dear life” before plunging to her death from the Texas Giant ride. This was Esparza’s first visit to the Six Flags theme park.

Following the tragedy, the Arlington Police Department and Six Flags conducted an investigation into what went wrong. The ride shut down for the rest of July and August, before reopening in September after the investigation found no evidence of mechanical failure. Added to the ride were restraining bar pads that had been redesigned, seat belts, and a coaster seat at the entrance so potential riders could determine whether they would fit into the cars securely. Esparza’s family learned that the coaster seat had remained stored after the Texas Giant ride reopened in 2011 following a $10 million renovation.

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