Landowner/Entrant PPT

1. WHAT STANDARD OF CARE IS OWED BY
POSSESSOR OF LAND TO ENTRANTS ON THE
LAND?

2. Last semester:
• Duty
• Breach – asks whether the defendant exercised the appropriate
standard of care under the circumstances
• Generally – the typical standard of care (S/C) is the reasonable person (RP)
S/C: the care a RP would exercise under the same or similar circumstances to
avoid reasonably foreseeable risks of harm to others.
• While standard stays the same, the degree of care owed may change depending on
the defendant’s knowledge, skill, physical ability, etc.
• Sometimes, the S/C based on applicable statutory language (negligence per
se)
• Damages
• Actual cause
• Proximate cause

3. Now:
• A defendant may owe a different S/C to the plaintiff
depending on WHO the plaintiff is.
• E.g., historically – common carriers owed higher S/C to
passengers.
• The degree of care doesn’t change as with the RP SC; rather the
standard itself is higher.

4. Landowners/Occupiers
May owe a different S/C to certain entrants on their
property.
• Trespasser
• Invitee
• Licensee
• Child trespasser

5. Trespasser
• A trespasser is any person who has no legal right to be on
another’s land.
• A trespasser may be an adult or a child. Different rules
may apply to child trespassers (see slides #10-11).

6. Invitee
• An invitee is any person on the land:
• At least in part for the pecuniary (monetary) benefit of the
landowner (a “business invitee”); OR
• On premises held open to the public generally (a “public invitee”)
• Examples:
• You are a business invitee when you shop in a merchant’s store.
• You are a public invitee when you are a visitor at a park.

7. Licensee
• A licensee is someone with permission to be on the
landowner’s land, but for a limited purpose.
• Example:
• The cable repairman is a licensee; he has the right to be on your
property to fix your cable, but he becomes a trespasser if you find
him snooping around your closet.
• Social guests.

8. S/C owed to Trespassers
• Landowners/occupiers owe a duty to avoid intentional,
willful or wanton injury with respect to hidden dangers on
the property.
• However, once the landowner/occupier knows or has
reason to know of imminent danger to the trespasser, the
landowner owes a trespasser the RP S/C.
• May owe a trespasser the RP S/C if the trespasser is a “known”
trespasser (e.g., landowner knows trespasser cuts through
landowner’s yard everyday).

9. S/C owed to Licensees
• The care owed by landowners/occupiers to licensees is
the same care as that owed by them to trespassers.

10. S/C owed to Child Trespassers
• Even though child trespasser is a trespasser,
landowner/occupier may owe a child trespasser the RP
S/C if there is an attractive nuisance on the landowner’s
property.

11. Attractive Nuisance Doctrine
• Landowner/occupier (here, “possessor”) subject to liability
to child trespasser caused by artificial conditions on
property if:
• The place where condition exists is one upon which possessor knows or has
reason to know children are likely to trespass; AND
• The condition is one of which possessor knows or has reason to know and
which he realizes or should realize will involve unreasonable risk of death or
serious bodily injury; AND
• The child, because of his youth does not realize the risk involved in
intermeddling with the condition; AND
• The utility to the possessor of maintaining the condition and the burden of
eliminating the danger are slight as compared to the risk; AND
• Possessor fails to exercise reasonable care to eliminate the danger or
otherwise protect the child.

12. Attractive Nuisance Doctrine
• If an attractive nuisance exists on the property, the
landowner/occupier owes a child trespasser the RP S/C.
• Attractive nuisance doctrine applies to children of grade-
school age or younger; rarely teenagers.
• The doctrine may also apply to natural conditions on the
land (e.g., a frozen pond) as opposed to artificial ones
(e.g., a swimming pool).

13. Open and Obvious Dangers
• Landowner/occupier will not be liable for plaintiff’s (usually
an invitee or licensee) injuries if they are a result of an
open and obvious danger.
• Generally, landowner has a duty to exercise the RP S/C to lawful
entrants to avoid reasonably foreseeable harm.
• Yet landowner’s duty does not extend to dangers that would be
obvious to persons of average intelligence (because it’s not
reasonable foreseeable that an entrant exercising reasonable care
for his own safety would suffer injury from a blatant hazard).

14. Firefighter’s Rule
• What care (if any) is owed by landowner to firefighter
when firefighter is injured fighting a fire on landowner’s
property?
• Generally speaking, if the fire was negligently caused (as opposed
to intentionally caused) by landowner, firefighter cannot recover
from landowner for any injuries suffered while fighting the fire.
• Some jurisdictions have limited or abolished this rule.

15. Adopting the RP S/C
• Some courts have determined that the entrant status rules
have created confusion. Thus, they have adopted a RP
S/C for all non-trespassing entrants.
• By 2008, about half the states had either included social
guests in invitee category, or had completely or partly
abolished the invitee/licensee categories, so that all non-
trespassing entrants are entitled to the RP S/C.

16. “Recreational Users” Statutes
• Statutes which immunize landowners from liability for
injuries suffered by any non-paying recreational users
utilizing landowner’s property.
• Thus, no liability (or limited liability) for
landowners/occupiers for injuries suffered by non-paying
entrants using the property for hiking, fishing, hunting,
camping, sightseeing, etc.