JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (Legal Newsline) – It’s back to square one for a lawsuit in Missouri that made it all the way to a $475,000 jury verdict, only to have the state Supreme Court order a restart.
The court ruled Jan. 11 that the jury in Pamela and Kelly Allen’s lawsuit over a fall down stairs at the Cape Girardeau courthouse was not properly instructed on the issue of sovereign immunity. It also said the trial judge improperly applied sovereign immunity to the City of Cape Girardeau because it owns half of the county courthouse.
It will result in a new trial, and the Allens will now be armed with the following passage from the Supreme Court opinion – “The State contends the stairs did not constitute a dangerous condition because they were an ‘open and obvious condition’ of which Allen knew and appreciated. This Court disagrees.”
Pamela Allen went to the courthouse, which was built in 1854, in 2013 to retrieve documents for a work assignment that were located in the basement. She had done the same task at least 50 times in the past.
The door to the staircase down was locked, and a clerk told Pamela to grab the key. She left the door slightly open to allow some light for her descent.
A few steps from the bottom, she slipped and broke her leg. She was forced to crawl back up the stairs to get help. The injury preceded a blood clot, a blockage in her lung artery, the death of lung tissue and a 12-day stay in the hospital.
Her lawsuit claimed the staircase was dangerous, and the city, county and state all claimed sovereign immunity to protect them from liability. The trial judge granted the city’s motion to dismiss but ruled against the state and county.
The county and city have each owned half of the building since 1959 but the county agreed in 1979 to be responsible for all maintenance and repairs. The city has the right to inspect it and withhold approval for changes.
Meanwhile, the county has allowed the state to use it since 1991.
A jury instruction asked whether the state “owned or controlled” the courthouse, and the state appealed, claiming it should have asked if the state had “exclusive control” over the stairway.
The jury was told it could only find the state or county – not both – at fault. They chose the state and apportioned 90% of the blame for the fall to the state and 10% to Allen.
“Without a doubt, the State was prejudiced by Instruction No. 8,” the court ruled. “Because the evidence clearly established the State did not legally own the Courthouse, Instruction No. 8 permitted the jury to find the State liable if the State had mere ‘control—but not exclusive possession and control’—over the Courthouse stairs.”
The Allens’ appeal argued the city was part-owner of the courthouse and shouldn’t have been dismissed as a defendant. The trial court had ruled the city lacked “exclusive control and possession.”
“This finding is clearly erroneous,” the decision says. “The Allens introduced evidence of an agreement between the City and the County showing each held an undivided one-half interest in ownership of the Courthouse.
“For purposes of establishing that a building is a ‘public entity’s property,’ the analysis stops upon a showing of actual or legal ownership by a public entity.
“A plaintiff seeking to establish injury on a ‘public entity’s property’ under section 537.600 need only introduce evidence the public entity had ‘exclusive possession and control’ of the property when the public entity does not have actual or legal ownership of the property.”
The Supreme Court affirmed the jury’s decision to reject the plaintiffs’ loss of consortium claim. The case is remanded to consider the liability of the city, county and state.