HARRISBURG – A panel trio of judges from the Superior Court of Pennsylvania ruled that a Butler County court was correct when it granted summary judgment to Sam’s Club, in the case of a man who suffered severe wrist and shoulder injuries while shopping in its store.
Superior Court judges Victor P. Stabile, Deborah A. Kunselman and Dan Pellegrini ruled on June 1 to uphold the Butler County Court of Common Pleas’s decision, in Randolph Dahl and Mary Katherine Dahl’s action against Sam’s East, Inc. (doing business as “Sam’s Club”).
“This is a premises liability case arising out of a trip and fall that happened while Mr. Dahl was shopping at Sam’s Club [on Jan. 4, 2017]. While in the produce section, he walked toward a flatbed restocking cart at the end of an aisle. He stopped at the cart and smelled strawberries that were stacked on top. After putting the strawberries back, he went to step around the cart. His right foot went past the cart, but his left foot got caught underneath, causing him to trip and fall,” Pellegrini said.
“The fall caused injuries to his knees and left elbow, as well as a fractured wrist and a torn rotator cuff. Seeking damages for those injuries, appellants sued Sam’s Club for negligence and loss of consortium, claiming that Sam’s Club had breached its duty of care by leaving the cart in the shopping aisle.”
During discovery, Mr. Dahl offered testimony that explained he walked toward the cart, smelled strawberries on the cart, was aware of the cart, and “was expecting the cart to be a four-foot cart, not a six- or eight-foot cart for some reason.”
Meanwhile, Mrs. Dahl testified slightly differently from her husband at her deposition on July 15, 2019, in that she stated that she took individual boxes out of the cart and asked her husband to smell the strawberries.
A deposition showed a blue cart with stacked boxes of strawberries on it sitting across the width of an aisle at the aisle’s end. Mr. Dahl testified that the photograph does not accurately represent the location of the cart on Jan. 4, 2017, in that the handle of the cart was essentially all the way back to where the coolers meet.
However, Sam’s Club store employee Terri Hoffman testified that an employee “should make sure that the cart was not empty, that it had items on it, visible items on it, and to make sure that they weren’t in a direct walking aisle left unattended.”
Hoffman added that the area where Mr. Dahl fell was clean, clear, and dry, and the only thing in the area was the cart with the strawberry boxes on it.
The trial court granted a motion for summary judgment from Sam’s Club.
“The trial court found that the cart was an open and obvious condition known by Mr. Dahl, as he was aware of the cart but failed to successfully step around it. Moreover, because the cart was open and obvious and Mr. Dahl was aware of it, the trial court found that Sam’s Club had no duty to warn of the dangerous condition,” Pellegrini said.
The plaintiffs then appealed to the Superior Court, believing that the trial court erred in granting summary judgment, based on its finding that the cart was an open and obvious condition to which Sam’s Club owed no duty to warn.
But, they would find no relief.
“There is no factual dispute over the position of the cart in the aisle since Mr. Dahl clarified its position in the photograph of the cart after the accident, and Sam’s Club stipulated to Mr. Dahl’s testimony about the position of the cart when he tripped over it,” Pellegrini said.
“Moreover, no reasonable minds could differ to the cart being a known obvious condition: Mr. Dahl admitted that he was aware of the cart as he walked in the aisle, and even stopped to smell the strawberries that were stacked on the flatbed of the cart.”
The Superior Court added they also found no merit in the plaintiffs’ claim that the trial court erred in granting summary judgment because Mr. Dahl was aware of the cart, but simply failed to successfully step around it.
“Here, there is no dispute that Mr. Dahl was aware of the cart, especially since he stopped at the cart to smell the strawberries that were on it. When he was done smelling the strawberries, he wanted to go on to the lemons,” Pellegrini said.
The Superior Court ultimately upheld the granting of summary judgment, ruling that these facts could not support an overturning of it.
“Appellants nevertheless assert that the trial court erred because of Sam’s Club policy not to leave carts in the aisle, arguing that it anticipated the harm of the open and obvious condition. However, they fail to explain how the store’s policy negates Mr. Dahl’s awareness of the cart and failure to exercise ordinary care in walking around it. Moreover, as Sam’s Club points out, appellants mischaracterize Sam’s Club internal policy for unattended carts,” Pellegrini concluded.
“As Teri Hofmann explained at her deposition, Sam’s Club employees were to make sure that unattended carts had items visible on them and that they were not left in a direct walking aisle. As Mr. Dahl admitted, the cart had items on it and was not fully blocking the aisle. We, thus, find no merit to appellants’ argument that Sam’s Club anticipated the potential harm to Mr. Dahl despite the open and obvious cart.”
Superior Court of Pennsylvania case 767 WDA 2020
Butler County Court of Common Pleas case 2018-11125
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com