Background
Kimberly Dawn Pairsh went to Compass Christian Church to pick up a child she nannied from its preschool. It had rained that morning and was raining heavily at dismissal, when about 50 people sought shelter at the church and some waited in the hallway serving the preschool.
After waiting 15 to 20 minutes in line and retrieving the child, Pairsh walked down the hallway, slipped, and fell. She did not see water before falling, but her hands and clothes were wet afterward. She sued the church and related defendants for negligence, alleging they failed to maintain the hallway and discover or correct a hazardous condition.
The superior court granted summary judgment for the defendants. Relying on an earlier intermediate appellate decision in Perez, it held that the floor condition was open and obvious and not unreasonably dangerous, so the church owed Pairsh no duty to warn or make the condition safe.
The Court’s Holding
The Arizona Court of Appeals vacated the judgment and remanded. Pairsh did not waive her arguments by filing her summary-judgment response one business day late, because the superior court considered it; nor did she need to file a post-judgment motion to preserve her appeal.
The court held that the superior court applied the wrong duty analysis. Under the Arizona Supreme Court’s later decision in Perez v. Circle K Convenience Stores, Inc., an invitee relationship established that the church owed Pairsh a duty to use reasonable care to discover, correct, or warn of foreseeable hazards. Whether the floor posed an unreasonable risk or was open and obvious concerns breach, not duty.
The appellate court did not decide whether the church breached its duty. Because the superior court stopped at duty and did not address the defendants’ breach arguments under the clarified legal standard, the court remanded for reconsideration.
Key Takeaways
- An invitee relationship can establish a land possessor’s duty of reasonable care.
- Open-and-obvious conditions and unreasonable risk generally go to breach, not the existence of duty.
- A timely considered late summary-judgment response does not waive appellate arguments.
Why It Matters
The decision applies the Arizona Supreme Court’s clarified premises-liability framework: courts should not use the alleged hazard’s obviousness or dangerousness to eliminate duty where a recognized relationship creates that duty. Those fact-sensitive considerations ordinarily belong in the breach analysis.
Because this is a memorandum decision, it is not precedential under Arizona Supreme Court Rule 111(c) and may be cited only as that rule permits.