Summary Judgment Granted in Store Bathroom Slip and Fall Case

In the case of Staley v. Price Chopper, No. 3908-CIVIL-2024 (C.P. Monroe Co. Aug. 11, 2025 Williamson, J.), the court granted summary judgment in a slip and fall matter that occurred at a grocery store.

According to the Opinion, the Plaintiff visited a grocery store and went to use the lady’s restroom. While in the restroom, the Plaintiff allegedly slipped on some unknown substance and fell.

After the completion of discovery, the defense filed a Motion for Summary Judgment asserting that the Plaintiff had failed to offer any evidence to show how or when the alleged substance came to be on the floor and/or that the store employees had any actual or constructive notice of the condition.

The court agreed with the defense position. The court noted that the Plaintiff failed to offer any evidence as to what substance allegedly caused her to fall. The Plaintiff admitted that she did not notice any wet spots on the floor before she fell. 

All the Plaintiff could state at her deposition was that she knew there was a liquid on the floot because her clothes were wet after the incident.  However, the record revealed not only that it may have been raining on the day of the accident but also that, when the Plaintiff fell in the bathroom stall area, her arm and hand had gone into the toilet.

The court also noted that, even considering the evidence in the light most favorable to the Plaintiff, the only conclusion is that the Plaintiff allegedly may have slipped on something wet. The court noted that it is not unusual for wet spots to be found in public restrooms, particularly around the toilet area. The court held that, without some indication of what the substance actually was, for example, from a leaking toilet or a spilled hand soap, it was difficult to determine from the record whether the condition that caused the Plaintiff was a long-standing condition as opposed to a transitory one.

In this regard, the court also noted that the Plaintiff failed to provide any evidence as to the length of time that the condition existed or if the Defendant store employees knew or should have known of the alleged condition.

The court also rejected the Plaintiff’s contention that the Defendant should have regularly checked the bathroom during the course of the day. The court noted that the Plaintiff did not produce any evidence in this regarding, including any chart under which employees would check off whether or not they had inspected the bathroom at certain times during day.

The Plaintiff also pointed to surveillance video of the store that shows that no employee entered the restroom for thirty (30) minutes prior to the Plaintiff’s fall. 

The court noted that while the video may show that no one attended to the restroom for thirty (30) minutes before the Plaintiff’s fall, that evidence does not translate to a finding that the Defendant was negligent in not cleaning the restroom that entire day. 

Rather, the court noted that the surveillance video simply showed that the restroom was not checked for thirty (30) minutes before the Plaintiff’s fall. The court held that this did not mean that the Defendant was aware of, or should have been aware of, an alleged dangerous condition that went unattended.

For these reasons, and others noted in the Opinion, the court granted summary judgment to the Defendant store.

Anyone wishing to review a copy of this decision may click this LINK.

It is noted that Daniel E. Cummins of Cummins Law was defense counsel in this matter.

Source of image: Photo by Juno Jo on www.unsplash.com.

Appellate Court Agrees That No Spoliation Occurred Where Camera Would Not Have Captured Area of the Incident

In a decision marked Non-Precedential in the the case of Conklin v. Wawa, Inc., No. 3006 EDA 2024 (Pa. Super. Aug. 6, 2025 Beck, J., Panella, P.J.E, Stabile, J.) (Op. by Beck, J.), the appellate court affirmed a trial court’s denial of post-trial motions in a slip and fall case.

Of note, the appellate court agreed that the Plaintiff was not entitled to an adverse inference jury charge based on the Defendant’s alleged spoliation of surveillance tapes.

In this matter, the record revealed that the video cameras could not have recorded the fall down event. Accordingly, the appellate court ruled that there was no basis for the claim that the fact that the tapes were routinely overwritten amounted to an intentional destruction of evidence.

The appellate court also found that the trial court did not abuse its discretion finding a lack of any fault to the Defendant with respect to the alleged loss of the evidence. The court additionally noted that, since the claimed fall would not have been on camera, there is no showing of any relevance or prejudice with respect to this evidence.

Anyone wishing to review a copy of this non-precedential decision may click this LINK.

I send thanks to Attorney James M. Beck of the Philadelphia office of the Reed Smith law firm for bringing this case to my attention.

Trial Court Denies Summary Judgment on Products Liability Claims Regarding Motorcycle

In the case of Windhorst v. Colvin, No. 11230 of 2019, C.A. (C.P. Lawr. Co. June 27, 2025 Hodge, J.), the court denied a Motion for Summary Judgment filed by Defendant, Harley Davidson Motor Company, after finding issues of fact in this products liability case arising out of a motorcycle accident.

In this matter, the Plaintiff alleged a designed defect in the lighting system of the motorcycle. 

One defense presented by the Defendants was that the Plaintiff had substantially altered the lighting system on the motorcycle prior to the accident. More specifically, there was evidence in the record that the Plaintiff had installed an after market LED headlamp on the motorcycle in an effort to improve the headlamp’s brightness. 

The record before the court confirmed that the Plaintiff took this step without following the specifications or alignment instructions in the owner’s manual for the motorcycle that was provided by the Defendants. It was also noted that the owner’s manual expressly warned against the use of non-specified parts and also outlined the appropriate wattage for headlamps.

The Defendants additionally contended that the Plaintiff’s claims for a negligent design and for strict product liability were legally insufficient as the subject motorcycle complied with all federal and state conspicuity regulations in terms pf head lamps. 

The Defendant additionally argued that, in any event, the Plaintiff was aware of the alleged design defect and assumed the risk by continuing to operate the motorcycle.

The court denied the Motion after finding genuine issues of material fact existed regarding whether there was an alleged design defect in the motorcycle’s lighting system. The court also found genuine issues of material fact on the issue of whether the Plaintiff had assumed the risk of injury.

The court noted that both parties had produced conflicting evidence on the issue presented through expert reports on the issues of whether or not a design defect existed.

The court additionally noted that, while compliance with government standards is relevant to a claim for negligent design, such evidence is not determinative in cases of strict product liability regarding allegations of defects.

Accordingly, the judge denied the Motion for Summary Judgment.

Anyone wishing to review a copy of this decision may click this LINK.


Source: The Legal Intelligencer Common Pleas Case Alert, www.Law.com (Sept. 18, 2025).

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Plaintiff Knocked Into By Dogs in Dog Park Gets Knocked Out of Court

In the case of Bushner v. Nimeh, No. 2024-C-0616 (C.P. Leh. Co. 2025 Reichley, J.), the court granted the Defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment in a case in which the Plaintiff was run into by two dogs in a dog park and allegedly sustained injuries. One of the dogs was a Great Dane and the other dog was a Labrador Retriever.

According to the Opinion, both dogs were wearing pronged collars and were on leashes at the park. At the Plaintiffs’ suggestion, after asking the Defendant dog owners if their two dogs were “good dogs,” all of the parties’ dogs were let off of their leashes and allowed to run and play with each other in the dog park.

The court noted that, at her deposition, the Plaintiff admitted that the dog at issue did not attack her. Also, when asked if there was anything she believed that the Defendants should have done differently before the dogs ran into her, the Plaintiff responded in the negative.

After discovery was completed, the Defendants filed their Motion for Summary Judgment at issue.

In addition to alleging negligence, the Plaintiffs asserted that, even though she invited the Defendants’ dogs to go unleashed, the Defendants still had a duty to warn the Plaintiff on whether the Defendants’ dogs would be controllable while unleashed and/or whether the dogs posed a serious threat to the safety of others in their vicinity.

The Plaintiffs further alleged that the Defendants knew that the dogs allegedly had dangerous propensities and that the dogs should not be allowed to be off-leash.  The Plaintiff based this allegation  on the fact that the Defendants knew that their dogs pulled on their leashes before and given that the Defendants used pronged collars on their dogs to help mitigate the pulling.

The court found that neither of these acts, in isolation or together, showed any tendency on the part of the Defendants’ dogs to do an act that might endanger the safety of the person and property of others. The court otherwise noted that the Plaintiff failed to produce any evidence to support allegations that the dogs in question had dangerous propensities of which the Defendants were aware.

The court also rejected the Plaintiff’s attempt to prove negligence under the Dog Law. The court noted that where proof of negligence rests upon a violation of the Dog Law, liability does not attach unless causation is also established. The court noted that the record was devoid of evidence to support a finding of negligence under the Dog Law.

Accordingly, the court rendered summary judgment in favor of the Defendants dog owners.

Anyone wishing to review a copy of this decision may click this LINK.


Source: “The Legal Intelligencer Common Pleas Case Alert,” www.Law.com (Aug. 7, 2025).

Source of image:  Photo by Rui Alves on www.unsplash.com.

Commonwealth Court Rules That Trial Court Erred in Giving Comparative Negligence Jury Instruction in Dog Bite Case

In its decision, which was listed as “Opinion not Reported,” (Why write and Opinion if your not going to report it?) in the case of Coffin v. Carbon County Animal Shelter, No. 1516 C.D. 2023 (Pa. Cmwlth. July 22, 2025 McCullough, J., Cannon, J., and Hannah Leavitt, S.J.) (Mem. Op. by Leavitt, S.J.), the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania overruled a trial court Order denying a Plaintiff’s Motion for a New Trial in a dog bite case.

According to the Opinion, the Plaintiff arrived at an animal shelter. While there, the Plaintiff was attacked by a dog. She was bitten on her leg and was also caused to fall. In addition to the suffering the dog bites, the Plaintiff broke both of her ankles in the fall and required surgery on one of her ankles.

After a trial, a jury entered a verdict in favor of the Plaintiff and awarded $40,000.00 but also assessed 50% of comparative negligence against the Plaintiff.

The Plaintiffs filed a post-trial motion asserting that the Defendant did not prove that the Plaintiff was negligent in any way.  The Plaintiff argued that, as such, the jury should not have been provided with jury instructions on comparative negligence. The trial court denied the Plaintiff’s Motion for a New Trial and the case was appealed to the Commonwealth Court.

The Commonwealth Court reversed and remanded and held that the trial court erred in instructing the jury on comparative negligence where there was no evidence that the Plaintiff had acted negligently.  The appellate court noted that the Plaintiff did not act negligently in allegedly failing to distance herself from a leashed dog that merely jumped towards the Plaintiff as it approached, only to then attack the Plaintiff unexpectedly from behind thereafter.

The court rejected the defense argument that the Plaintiff was negligent in allowing the dog to get close to her, which allowed the dog to attack. 

The appellate court noted that, while the Plaintiff may have understood the risks posed by the dog as involving the possibility that the dog would jump at her again, there was no indication for the Plaintiff that a vicious attack would possibly occur. The court noted that the Plaintiff’s previous brief encounter with the dog was not sufficient to put the Plaintiff on notice of the dog’s vicious propensities. The court noted that the previous jump was not, according to the evidence, accompanied by a growl, a snap, or any attempt by the dog to harm the Plaintiff.

Accordingly, the court found that there was no evidence of any negligence on the part of the Plaintiff relative to the dog getting close to the Plaintiff a second time. Therefore, there was no support for the trial court to have given the jury the Comparative Negligence jury instruction.

The case was remanded back for the entry of an Order awarding the Plaintiff the total damages awarded by the jury at trial.

Anyone wishing to review a copy of this non-precedential decision may click this LINK.


Source: The Legal Intelligencer State Appellate Case Alert, www.Law.com (Aug. 19, 2025).

Source of image:  Photo by Pixabay on www.pexels.com.

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