Grocery Store Landowner Not Responsible for Patrons’ Injuries Arising from Vehicle-Pedestrian Collision in Parking Lot

The Indiana Court of Appeals recently found in favor of a grocery store landlord in a premise liability claim for personal injuries arising out of a vehicle-pedestrian collision in a grocery store parking lot. In Poppe v. Angell Enterprises, Inc., Paul Poppe and Susan Poppe were struck by an intoxicated driver and injured as they exited a grocery store. When they exited the store, the Poppes walked through a marked crosswalk to reach their vehicle, which was parked in a handicapped parking spot. As they were walking, they saw a quickly approaching truck and tried to run to get out of the way; however, the truck pinned them against their vehicle. Angell Enterprises, Inc. (“Angell”) was the landlord of the grocery store and responsible for maintaining the grocery store parking lot. In their injury lawsuit filed against Angell and other parties, the Poppes alleged that Angell was liable in part for their injuries by the condition of the parking lot in “the funneling of pedestrian and vehicular traffic” into the crosswalk without “protective features” such as “bollards,” which are protective posts often used in areas with vehicular and pedestrian traffic.

At the time of the appeal in this case, Angell was the sole remaining defendant. To succeed in their claim against Angell, the Poppes were required to prove (1) Angell owed them a duty of care, (2) Angell breached that duty, and (3) Angell’s breach proximately caused their injuries. Whether a duty exists is a question of law for the court to decide, and absent a duty, there can be no breach and therefore no liability. Angell moved for summary judgment in court arguing that it owed the Poppes no duty and therefore was entitled to judgment as a matter of law. After a hearing, the trial court entered summary judgment in favor of Angell, and the Poppes appealed.

To decide whether Angell owed the Poppes a duty, the Indiana Court of Appeals was first required to decide whether to apply the landowner liability analytical framework in Burrell v. Meads (based upon Restatement (Second) of Torts Section 343) that applies when injuries result from a condition on land, or the analytical framework in Goodwin v. Yeakle’s Sports Bar & Grill, Inc. that applies when injuries result from the criminal acts of a third person. The Burrell analysis provides that a landowner is responsible for injuries to invitees resulting from a condition on land but only if the landowner knew, or should have known, of the condition and that it involved an unreasonable danger of harm, if the landowner should have expected its invitees would not realize the danger or protect themselves against it, and if the landowner failed to exercise reasonable care to protect its invitees. The Goodwin foreseeability analysis of duty in the case of criminal acts of third parties causing injuries focuses on the “broad type of plaintiff and harm involved, without regard to the facts of the actual occurrence,” and turns on “whether there is some probability or likelihood of harm that is serious enough to induce a reasonable person to take precautions to avoid it.”

Here, the Court of Appeals agreed with Angell that the Goodwin analysis applied because the Poppes were injured, not as a result of a condition on land, but as a result of the criminal acts of a third party, the intoxicated truck driver. Applying the Goodwin analysis, the Court found the broad type of plaintiff was a grocery store patron and the broad type of harm was “a random intoxicated driver losing control of his vehicle and striking a patron,” and Angell could not have known or reasonably foreseen the Poppes would be struck by an intoxicated driver in the store parking lot. The Court held Angell had no duty to protect the Poppes from the random criminal acts of an intoxicated driver, and therefore, affirmed the judgment of the trial court in favor of Angell dismissing the Poppes’ personal injury claims against it.

You can read the full opinion here.