The Second District Court of Appeal of Florida recently decided the case of Stephanie Pio v. Simon Capital GP, Macy’s Florida Stores, LLC, and Luke’s Landscaping, Inc., No. 2D21-1621 (2nd DCA July 7, 2023), in which it affirmed the trial court’s granting of summary judgment in favor of the Defendants in an action that arose from a trip and fall accident within a landscaped area.
Plaintiff, Stephanie Pio, appealed the court’s final summary judgment order entered in favor of Simon Capital GP, one of the defendants in the case. The incident occurred at Tyrone Square Mall in St. Petersburg, Florida. Pio alleged that she sustained an injury after stepping into a concealed hole when she attempted to walk across a landscaped area outside the shopping mall. Pio filed a complaint against Macy's Stores, Simon Capital, and Luke's Landscaping, which was contracted to conduct the mall's landscaping.
The trial court granted separate summary judgments for all three defendants, prompting Pio to appeal the decision concerning Simon, as the party in control of the subject premises. The central question revolved around whether the landscaped area in which Pio tripped and fell could be classified as open and obvious. The trial court's rationale was grounded in prior case law where landscaping features were generally considered non-dangerous or open and obvious conditions as a matter of law. The court distinguished Pio's case from other precedent that was favorable to the plaintiff by noting that there was no evidence demonstrating that the area where Pio tripped and fell was regularly traversed by pedestrians.
Pio's appeal rested on two primary contentions. First, she argued that the depression in the grass constituted a foreseeable hazard. Second, she maintained that Simon should be held vicariously liable for the actions of Luke's Landscaping, which she alleged created the hazard or failed to remove it. The Second District determined that Pio's presented evidence failed to substantiate her claim that a pedestrian walking through the landscaping and encountering a depression in the grass was foreseeable, as paved walkways were provided for pedestrian use. Moreover, since Luke's was not found liable, the notion of vicarious liability for Simon was untenable.
The Second District cited a prior case, Wolf v. Sam's East, Inc., 132 So. 3d 305 (Fla. 4th DCA 2014), which involved a similar set of facts. In Wolf, the court ruled that the presence of tree roots in a landscaping area, though visible, were not inherently dangerous and thus constituted a non-dangerous condition as a matter of law. The court reinforced its judgment by highlighting the fact that the property owner had provided paved walkways for pedestrian traffic, making a safer pedestrian route than through the landscaped area, and held that the plainitff had a responsibility to exercise caution in the presence of potential hazards.
Pio further underscores the established principle in Florida premises liability law that a property owner’s responsibility of maintaining its premises in a safe condition and warning of concealed hazards does not extend to areas that are not intended for pedestrian traffic. Where a pedestrian chooses to take a detour through such an area, she does so at her own peril.