Background
Luciana Lynette Clark sued the City of Chicago after she tripped and fell on a deteriorated sidewalk at O’Hare International Airport in December 2020. Clark, who worked in Terminal 5, was returning from a Department of Transportation office in Terminal 3 when she encountered metal plates and a damaged sidewalk seam.
Clark testified that she focused on avoiding raised metal plates and an approaching pedestrian when her foot struck a hole or missing chunk of concrete. The seam was less than one-half inch deep but measured roughly three to five inches wide and four feet long. City evidence showed it had received earlier reports of deteriorated concrete nearby and had prepared, but not completed, proposed repairs.
The Cook County circuit court granted summary judgment for the City, holding the defect was de minimis. It did not address the City’s alternative argument that the condition was open and obvious.
The Court’s Holding
The appellate court reversed and remanded. It held that the sidewalk condition was not de minimis as a matter of law because the inquiry requires consideration of the totality of the circumstances, not merely the less-than-half-inch vertical depth. The seam’s width and length, Clark’s testimony about a missing piece of concrete, and the deteriorated condition shown in photographs created a factual question about whether the defect was foreseeably dangerous.
The court also declined to affirm on the City’s open-and-obvious defense. Although Clark did not dispute that the sidewalk condition was open and obvious, the record supported competing reasonable inferences about whether she was actually distracted by metal plates placed by the City and whether that distraction was foreseeable. Those issues, including credibility, could not be decided on summary judgment.
Key Takeaways
- A sidewalk defect’s height differential alone does not control the de minimis analysis.
- Width, length, deterioration, and missing concrete can create a triable issue even where the vertical differential is slight.
- The distraction exception may apply when a plaintiff is focused on a separate hazard created or known by the defendant.
Why It Matters
The decision reinforces that Illinois courts must assess sidewalk-defect claims contextually rather than apply a mechanical height threshold. Municipal defendants cannot obtain summary judgment solely because a defect is shallow where evidence indicates a broader, deteriorated, or otherwise hazardous condition.
It also illustrates that an open-and-obvious condition does not necessarily end the duty inquiry. Evidence that a defendant-created condition diverted a pedestrian’s attention can require factfinder resolution under the distraction exception.