54 Ga. App. 9 | Ga. Ct. App. | 1936
“If upon the premises of an owner situated in dangerous proximity to a public thoroughfare there be an excavation into which persons passing along the thoroughfare, in the exercise of ordinary care, might casually fall, it is the duty of the owner of the premises so to inclose the same as to afford reasonable immunity against the danger which might otherwise probably result from its existence. Whatever may be the duty of an owner of premises with reference to persons who unlawfully intrude thereon, such owner has no right to maintain upon his premises any dangerous nuisance which might imperil the lives of those persons who from lawful necessity or convenience might pass along, and by accident or some superior force, and without fault upon their part, fall or be thrown from the sidewalk or from a public thoroughfare into such excavation. A man must so guard his premises situated immediately adjacent to a public highway, as that one who of necessity deviates slightly therefrom may not be injured.” Hutson v. King, 95 Ga. 271 (22 S. E. 615). “The
Under the foregoing principles, the verdict in favor of the plaintiff against the landowners in the instant case was contrary to law, because it was without evidence to support it, where, under the undisputed testimony, the injury occurred by a fall from a privately-owned parking lot, and at least twenty-five or thirty feet from a public street, while the plaintiff at night was preparing to enter a parked automobile; where he fell from the adjoining retaining wall on the parking lot to the bottom of a ten-foot depres
Judgment reversed.