Thieves Beware of the dangerous roof!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

fred7777

Andy_L wrote: »

Urban myth.

It's mostly an urban myth.

Sueing is not the same as winning and the fact that someone can try to sue you doesn't mean they will succeed or you are liable. However someone sueing with a case they can't win will still cost a substantial amount of time and money.

I will continue to believe a burglar winning a case against a victim is an urban myth until someone can point me in the direction of a verifiable story about a burglar sueing a victim and winning.

esuhl

fred7777 wrote: »

I will continue to believe a burglar winning a case against a victim is an urban myth until someone can point me in the direction of a verifiable story about a burglar sueing a victim and winning.

I'm no legal beagle, but I've had a quick search (out of curiosity) and I haven't so far found a case where a burgler has successfully sued a landowner for injuries sustained whilst trespassing on their property.

However, I found one case (Donoghue v Folkestone Properties Ltd) where a man trespassed on harbour property whilst drunk, ignored warning signs telling people not to swim as it was dangerous and shallow, and broke his neck. He sued the harbour and initially won 25% of the damages he was seeking, although an appeal overturned this and found the harbour not liable.

It seems that the relevant legislation is the Occupiers' Liability Act 1984. From my skimming of the case notes (and I may have got this a bit wrong!) it seems that IF a landowner could anticipate that trespassers will visit AND if they do would be likely to injure themselves... AND the landowner has the resources to mitigate that risk AND does nothing about it, then they COULD be at fault.

Any kind of deliberate and concealed "trap" (weapons attached to tripwires, deep pits, etc.) would certainly be unlawful, but the landowner would not be expected to prevent injury from any kind of "natural feature" of the land (e.g. steep cliff, deep water, etc.).

A few other examples were given. If a landowner removes a step from a staircase for repair, he/she would not have a duty to protect a burgler from injury. I presume that this wouldn't apply if the step had been deliberately removed to injure trespassers.

Also, a farmer selling animals would have a duty to protect invited/anticipated customers by keeping the entry paths safe and protecting them from dangerous animals, etc. But, would not have a duty to protect thieves entering at night and injuring themselves on rusty nails on a gate that they could not see or if they jumped over a fence and injured themselves on farm tools, etc.

And finally, different considerations would be given if children were injured, depending on their ability/liklihood to heed any given verbal/written warnings, their ability to anticipate danger, the attractiveness of engaging in a dangerous activity (i.e. if a huge supply of sweets was on display and could be accessed across a dangerous/weak roof).

So... going back to the original post, if the school could reasonably expect thieves to return, and if the roof presents a danger that the thieves could not reasonably anticipate, then I think the school would be required to put warnings up... but after all this head-scratching I'm still not sure!

Why is the law so complicated?!

geri1965_2

That's an excellent post. As a liability loss adjuster, I am impressed

poet123

The problem for most schools is that they are told by their LEA's to put up the signs as the LEA will not back a school where his has not been done and a case ensued. Therefore, in that instance the Governors would be liable to fight the case and the school pay the costs. It is simply not worth ignoring a directive from the LEA in case in comes back to bite you.

Andy_L

esuhl wrote: »

I'm no legal beagle, but I've had a quick search (out of curiosity) and I haven't so far found a case where a burgler has successfully sued a landowner for injuries sustained whilst trespassing on their property.

I believe that they could be prosecuted by the HSE if, eg, a burgular fell of some scaffolding and the subsequent investigation found the scaffolding didn't conform to the building regs (as would be the case if a worker fell off the scaffolding) but that is significantly different to the burgular suing.

vyle

esuhl wrote: »

So... going back to the original post, if the school could reasonably expect thieves to return, and if the roof presents a danger that the thieves could not reasonably anticipate

Surely a thief could reasonably anticipate that stealing important parts of the roof might make it weaker?

esuhl

vyle wrote: »

Surely a thief could reasonably anticipate that stealing important parts of the roof might make it weaker?

But they might not anticipate that a roof 0.5m above the ground that appears to be made from reinforced steel is actually made from fibre glass and conceals a pit 30m deep with spikes at the bottom, for example.

From the sound of it (and the fact that I had difficulty in finding any relevant cases), the law gives a thief a theoretical right to sue their victim, but only in exceptional circumstances.

Essentially, if your land could reasonably be described as "a death trap" and you could anticipate being burgled and yet you don't take action to prevent injury, you're in the wrong.

Reading between the lines, I think the "point" of the law is to prevent landowners from booby-trapping their property and claiming that they have no liability whatsoever towards intruders. Imagine an orchard owner who regularly sees 5 year olds scrumping the odd apple or two. You wouldn't want him setting tripwires and killing anyone who ventures onto his land.

patman99

Funnily-enough, my local Police are advising people to protect their properties by attaching spikes along the tops of gates and fences.

A lot of Churches, public buildings and schools are replacing lead with stainless steel. This despite stainless steel being worth 40% more scrap value than lead. Go figure!!

Sharon87

So what happened in Home Alone would be totally against the law in this country No bowling balls whacking burglars on the head or slippery marbles/oil on the floor. What a shame

esuhl

Sharon87 wrote: »

So what happened in Home Alone would be totally against the law in this country No bowling balls whacking burglars on the head or slippery marbles/oil on the floor. What a shame

How old was Macaulay Culkin in the film? If he was under 10, he'd be below the age of criminal responsibility! Grease up those stairs and prepare the roller skates, kid!