Occupier's Liability Claim Dismissed Where Plaintiff Did Not Know Why He Fell Down Stairs

Reasons for judgement were published today by the BC Supreme Court, Vancouver Registry, dismissing an occupier’s liability lawsuit involving a plaintiff who was injured after falling down stairs.
In the recent case (Goddard v. Bayside Property Services Ltd.) the plaintiff “fell on a wooden exterior staircase outside a fire exit” at the rear of a property owned by the Defendant.  The Plaintiff did not know why he fell and did not produce any evidence documenting the stairs being a hazard at the time of the fall.  In dismissing the claim via a summary trial application Mr. Justice Ball provided the following reasons:

[17]         In this case, the plaintiff advanced a theory about what caused his fall, but the Court cannot speculate in respect to a theory; the cause of the fall has not been established on the evidence called by the plaintiff.

[18]         The standard of care under the Act and at common law for negligence is the same: it is to protect others from an objectively unreasonable risk of harm. Whether a risk is reasonable or unreasonable is a question of fact and must be determined based on the circumstances of the case: Agar v. Weber, 2014 BCCA 297 at para. 30.

[19]         The existence of stairs by itself is not an unreasonable risk of harm, but a risk that persons in our society face on a daily basis. The existence of stairs is not therefore something from which the defendants needed to protect the plaintiff: Trinetti v. Hunter, 2005 BCCA 549 at para. 11; Delgado v. Wong, 2004 BCSC 1199 at para. 25.

[20]         The fact of the plaintiff’s fall does not establish that the occupier failed to take reasonable care to ensure the plaintiff was reasonably safe. The plaintiff’s uncontroverted evidence, which was accepted by the defendants, is that he does not know what caused him to fall. If that is the case, he cannot establish the defendants caused the fall and he fails then to establish either negligence or breach of a duty under the Act.

[21]         Further, given the detailed description of the inspection and maintenance of the staircase involved by the staff and owners of the strata, the defendants have met the requisite standard of care under both the Act and common law negligence.

[22]         While the Court heard argument concerning allegations the plaintiff was negligent and submissions relating to quantum of damages, I do not regard those matters as necessary for the purpose of giving judgment.

[23]         In the circumstances of this case, the plaintiff has clearly not met the onus which he bears, and as a result the action falls to be dismissed.