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STATE OF MICHIGAN
COURT OF APPEALS


NIDAL HADID, Individually and as Next Friend of RICKY HADID, a minor, Plaintiff-Appellant, v HARTMAN & TYNER, INC. d/b/a/ WOODWARD NORTH APARTMENTS, Defendant-Appellee.

UNPUBLISHED March 5, 1999

No. 205799 Oakland Circuit Court LC No. 96-518315 NO

Before: Markman, P.J., and Jansen and J.B. Sullivan*, JJ. PER CURIAM. In this premises liability action, plaintiff appeals as of right the trial court's grant of summary disposition in favor of defendant. We affirm. On March 27, 1995, nine-year-old Ricky Hadid was visiting a relative, who occupied an apartment in defendant's building. During the course of his visit, Ricky went to the lobby of the building, where he encountered three other boys. Two of them held the glass door to the lobby shut while the other pushed Ricky into it. The glass of the door was not fitted with safety glazing material, or "safety glass" and, when it shattered, Ricky received a laceration to the palm of his right hand. Plaintiff sued defendant, alleging that the failure to outfit the glass door with safety glazing material was a breach of defendant's duty to keep its premises in a reasonably safe condition for invitees1 and that the glass door, being unreasonably dangerous to the public, constituted a nuisance. The trial court granted defendant's motion for summary disposition pursuant to MCR 2.116(C)(10) with regard to the negligence claim on the grounds that defendant owed no duty to warn plaintiff of the door because its danger was open and obvious, and that the intervening acts of the other children actually caused Ricky's injury; and pursuant to both MCR 2.116(C)(8) and MCR 2.116(C)(10)2 with regard to the nuisance claim because it merely restated plaintiff's negligence claim. * Former Court of Appeals judge, sitting on the Court of Appeals by assignment. -1

We review decisions on motions for summary disposition de novo. Spiek v Transportation Dep't , 456 Mich 331, 337; 572 NW2d 201 (1998). A motion for summary disposition under MCR 2.116(C)(8) tests the legal sufficiency of a claim on the pleadings alone. All allegations and reasonable inferences which support the claim are taken as true. Kuhn v Secretary of State, 228 Mich App 319, 323; 579 NW2d 101 (1998). A motion for summary disposition pursuant to MCR 2.116(C)(10) tests whether their is a genuine issue of material fact which would preclude judgment as a matter of law. It must be supported by documentary evidence and all reasonable inferences are drawn in favor of the nonmoving party. Spiek, supra at 337; Bertrand v Alan Ford, 449 Mich 606, 617-18; 537 NW2d 185 (1995). On appeal, plaintiff first argues that the trial court improperly granted defendant's motion for summary disposition. Plaintiff contends that there are genuine issues of material fact remaining whether the glass door was an open and obvious danger and whether plaintiff could have avoided the danger even if he could have discovered it, and thus, whether defendant breached a duty of care owed to invitees by not replacing the door with "safety glass."3 However, even if we assume, without deciding, that defendant did breach a duty of care owed to invitees, plaintiff would still be required to prove that defendant's breach caused the injury in order to establish a prima facie case of negligence. Reeves v Kmart Corp, 229 Mich App 466, 479; 582 NW2d 841 (1998). In order to prove causation, plaintiff must show that defendant's action (or lack thereof) was both the cause in fact and the proximate cause of the injury. Skinner v Square D Co, 445 Mich 153, 162-63; 516 NW2d 475 (1994). The causation issue in this case is one of proximate cause.4 "[L]egal cause or `proximate cause' normally involves examining the foreseeability of particular consequences." Skinner, supra at 163. When several factors contribute to an injury, each factor that was a substantial factor in bringing about an injury will be considered a proximate cause of such harm. Hagerman v Gencorp Automotive, 457 Mich 720, 737-38, 749; 579 NW2d 347 (1998). Although there may be more than one proximate cause of an injury, all of which are considered liable for such injury, where an intervening third party's actions work to cause injury following the negligence of the defendant, this intervening act may relieve the defendant of liability. Poe v Detroit, 179 Mich App 564, 576-77; 446 NW2d 523 (1989). A third party's intervening act cannot be considered a superseding cause, and thus relieve a defendant of liability, if any of the following are applicable: (a) [defendant] at the time of his negligent conduct should have realized that a third person might so act, or (b) a reasonable man knowing the situation existing when the act of the third person was done would not regard it as highly extraordinary that the third person had so acted, or (c) the intervening act is a normal consequence of a situation created by the actor's conduct and the manner in which it is done is not extraordinarily negligent. [Rogers v Detroit, 457 Mich 125, 143-44; 579 NW2d 840 (1998).] Thus, an intervening cause is a superseding cause if it was not reasonably foreseeable. Hickey v Zezulka, 439 Mich 408, 437; 487 NW2d 106 (Brickley, J., Mallett and Levin, JJ., concurring), 447

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(Riley, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part, Cavanagh, CJ, and Boyle and Griffin, JJ., concurring) (1992). In this case, defendant claimed that the acts of the children who held the door closed and pushed Ricky into the glass were a superseding cause of his injury and that its own negligence, if any, was thus not a proximate cause. Generally, a premises owner does not have a duty to protect his invitees against the general incidence of crime in the community. Mason v Royal Dequindre, Inc, 455 Mich 391, 401; 566 NW2d 199 (1997). The Supreme Court in Mason quoted Comment f to

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