When One Door Closes Unexpectedly, Maybe It’s an Unreasonable Risk of Harm

Premises liability actions after Kandil-Elsayed have changed the landscape in many ways, but the requirements for duty, breach, and notice remain, if in altered form. Here, defendant ran a business catering to the rehabilitation of those recovering from injuries and the elderly, who often required aids such as walkers or canes to walk and moved particularly slowly. Because the residents were on the premises for the business benefit of defendant, they were considered invitees. As invitees, defendant owed a duty to use reasonable care to look for risks, to preemptively address those risks to make them safe, and was considered to have constructive notice of any risks that could have been discovered with reasonable inspection. Simply relying on compliance with minimum code or minimum standards for a subset of the population was insufficient, especially considering that minimum code for one subset of the population does not by default meet the standard of reasonable care for a different subset.

To give defendant some credit, they did attempt to make the premises safe,—the doors operated according to ADA standards and were inspected routinely for problems—but defendant also had to balance the time that the doors were open against the risk of flight from confused residents. Nevertheless, the Court of Appeals decision here is fairly clear that had defendant been slightly more diligent in making the premises safe—for example, adding basic safety sensors to make sure a doorway was clear before the door closed—the standard of reasonable efforts and reasonable care may well have been met. However, lacking anything beyond the basic push-button automation, even with ADA-compliant timing, the Court had no option but to conclude that a genuine issue of material fact remained for a jury to determine.