Occidental Chem. Corp. v. Jenkins
No. 13-0961
Case Summary written by Kylie Rahl, Staff Member.
JUSTICE DEVINE delivered the opinion of the Court.
Occidental Chemical Corporation owned a chemical plant that produced triethylene glycol (TEG), a chemical compound with a variety of industrial and commercial uses. The production occurred in a large tank where the TEG had to be maintained at a certain acidity level. Technicians originally regulated the acidity level by hand until 1992, when Occidental designed and attached a device known as the acid-addition system to the tank in order to make adding acid to the tank a safer process. In 1998, Occidental sold the plant to Equistar Chemicals, L.P., Jason Jenkin’s employer. In 2006, the acid-addition system that had been used fourteen years without incident caused injury to Jenkins when acid was expelled into his face and eyes. Jenkins sued Occidental alleging that Occidental’s negligent design of the acid-addition system caused his injuries.
Issue: Whether a property owner who creates a dangerous condition on the property owes both a duty in premises liability to warn of the dangerous condition or make it safe and a duty in negligence to use reasonable care not to create the dangerous condition in the first place.
The Court held Occidental owed Jenkins no duty of care regarding the property’s condition because the duty had passed to Equistar eight years before Jenkin’s injury. With respect to land conveyances, the doctrine of caveat emptor retains much of its original force, requiring the recipient of land to make his own inspection of the property and relieving the previous owner of responsibility for its existing defects. Thus, owners of real property are not liable for injuries caused by dangerous conditions on real property after the owners convey the property.
Even though there is an exception where the creator of a dangerous condition can remain liable for the condition after relinquishing control of the property, that exception applies when an independent contractor created the dangerous condition, which is judged under ordinary negligence principles. The Court held that when a property owner is also the designer and creator of the defective improvement, the property owner does not act in dual-capacity as both the property owner and independent contractor when improving its own property. As a result, only premises liability principles apply to a property owner who created a dangerous condition on its property. Under these circumstances, because the injury occurred after the creator of the condition conveyed the property, the premises-liability claim lies against the property’s new owner, who ordinarily assumes responsibility for the property’s condition with the conveyance.