Mellon Mortgage Co. v. Holder
1999 WL 694868, 5 S.W.3d 654 (1999)
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Rule of Law:
A property owner has no legal duty to protect a person from the criminal acts of a third party if it was not foreseeable that the specific victim, or someone similarly situated, would be on the premises and thus subject to the harm. Foreseeability requires not only that the general type of crime be foreseeable, but also that the injured party be within the class of persons who might foreseeably be at risk.
Facts:
- While driving at 3:30 a.m. in downtown Houston, Angela Holder was stopped by Calvin Potter, an on-duty Houston police officer.
- Potter took Holder's identification and instructed her to follow his squad car.
- Holder followed Potter for several blocks to a parking garage owned by Mellon Mortgage Company.
- Once inside the parking garage, Potter sexually assaulted Holder in his squad car.
- Prior to the assault, Mellon was aware that its garage had security issues; vagrants frequented the property and at least one employee's car had been stolen from the garage.
- A Mellon employee had complained to management about the 'virtually non-existent security' and requested an escort to her car when working late.
- Mellon provided armed security patrols on weekdays during business and evening hours (5:45 a.m. to 11:30 p.m.), but not at the time of the assault.
Procedural Posture:
- Angela Holder sued Mellon Mortgage Company and the City of Houston in a state trial court.
- The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of both Mellon and the City on all of Holder's claims.
- Holder (appellant) appealed the trial court's decision to the court of appeals.
- The court of appeals affirmed the summary judgment for the City but reversed the summary judgment for Mellon (appellee) on the negligence, gross negligence, and loss of consortium claims, remanding them for trial.
- Mellon (petitioner) petitioned the Supreme Court of Texas for review of the court of appeals' decision.
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Issue:
Does a property owner owe a legal duty to protect a person from the criminal acts of a third party when that person is brought to the property from several blocks away by the criminal, and is not a member of a class of victims the property owner could reasonably foresee being harmed on the premises?
Opinions:
Majority - Justice Abbott
No. Mellon owed no legal duty to Holder because she was not a foreseeable victim. For a landowner's duty to arise, foreseeability requires both that the general danger be foreseeable and that the injured party be so situated that injury to them might reasonably have been foreseen. While violent crime in the garage may have been generally foreseeable, Holder was not a member of any class of persons, such as employees or regular patrons, that Mellon could have reasonably foreseen would be the victim of a crime in its garage. She was brought to the location by a third party from several blocks away, placing her outside the 'range of apprehension' for whom Mellon owed a duty of care. To impose a duty in such circumstances would make landowners insurers of crime victims, regardless of the lack of connection between the landowner and the victim or perpetrator.
Concurring - Justice Enoch
No. Mellon owed no duty to Holder, but the analysis should be based on traditional premises liability classifications, not the plurality's foreseeability test. A landowner's duty is determined by the entrant's status as an invitee, licensee, or trespasser. Holder entered without Mellon's consent or knowledge, making her a trespasser, even though her entry was involuntary. The only duty owed to a trespasser is not to cause injury intentionally, willfully, or through gross negligence, a duty Mellon did not breach. The plurality's approach improperly risks creating a general duty of reasonable care for landowners, which is not the law in Texas.
Concurring - Justice Baker
No. Mellon owed no duty to Holder because the specific crime of sexual assault was not foreseeable as a matter of law. The proper analysis relies on the Timberwalk factors (similarity, proximity, recency, frequency, publicity of prior crimes). Although there were property crimes in the garage (vagrancy, car theft) and violent crimes in the surrounding area, there were no prior violent personal crimes on the premises. The prior property crimes were not sufficiently similar to a sexual assault to put Mellon on notice of that specific danger. The plurality's use of the Palsgraf 'foreseeable plaintiff' test improperly shifts a proximate cause issue, typically for the jury, into the duty analysis, which is a question of law for the court.
Dissenting - Justice O'Neill
Yes. A genuine issue of material fact exists regarding Mellon's duty, and summary judgment was improper. The sheer frequency and severity of violent crime in the immediate vicinity (190 violent crimes, including murders and rapes), combined with employee complaints and Mellon's knowledge of vagrants, made a violent crime in the unsecure garage foreseeable. Furthermore, a fact issue exists as to Holder's status; by knowingly tolerating vagrants and failing to secure the garage, Mellon may have given implied consent for the public to enter, potentially making Holder a licensee rather than a trespasser. If she was a licensee, Mellon owed her a higher duty of care, and a jury should determine if that duty was breached.
Analysis:
This case significantly refines the concept of foreseeability in Texas premises liability law, particularly concerning third-party criminal acts. The plurality's opinion, by incorporating the Palsgraf 'foreseeable plaintiff' doctrine directly into the duty analysis, narrows the scope of a landowner's liability. This approach shifts a key factual consideration, traditionally part of the jury's proximate cause inquiry, to a threshold legal question for the judge, making it easier for defendants to win on summary judgment. The fractured nature of the decision, with three different analyses on the prevailing side, highlights the deep jurisprudential divisions on how to balance landowner rights with public safety and the respective roles of judge and jury.
