45D04-1902-CT-000232 (Lake County, Indiana)
Plaintiff was walking to her place of employment at a strip mall in Indiana, where she alleged that she tripped and fell on rocks that were displaced from a large decorative rock bed. Plaintiff sued the business and property owner alleging negligence and premises liability counts. Brian Brenn took up defense of the property owner, and was skeptical of the circumstances of the fall. He aimed to set the case up for a motion for summary judgment and took multiple depositions with this in mind.
Brian procured key deposition testimony from Plaintiff’s co-worker that she had not observed any rocks out of place, just thirty minutes prior to Plaintiff’s fall. After depositions, Brian filed his motion showing that there were no rocks in the area where the Plaintiff fell and furthermore that the defendants could not have had notice of any dangerous condition.
The Lake County Court granted Brian’s motion, noting that “Short of imposing a strict liability standard on landscaping rocks (which are common in Lake County to the point of banality, and not inherently dangerous) there is no genuine issue of fact presented in this case that any of the Defendants has constructive knowledge of the condition alleged to exist by Plaintiff.”
Brian was thrilled to procure this result for our client. As any practitioner in Lake County, Indiana can attest, it is a difficult task to win a dispositive motion in that venue no matter the set of facts.
