Hotel Accidents – Lodging Injuries and the Law
Feb 13th, 2009 by Legal Staff
Each year, many people are seriously injured while staying at a hotel, motel, inn, “bed and breakfast,” or other lodging. Sometimes the injuries are catastrophic, such as a high-rise hotel catching fire that destroys several floors and results in a number of deaths, severe burns, or other serious injuries. Or a child may drown in an improperly gated swimming pool. Sometimes, lodgers are injured by dangerous conditions on the property, such as slippery stairs.
A customer of a hotel, motel, or inn is a lodger or guest, not a tenant. The main difference between a lodger and a tenant under a rental agreement or lease lies in the character of possession. A tenant has exclusive legal possession of the premises; a lodger, on the other hand, has only the right to use the premises, subject to the innkeeper’s retention of control and right of access to them.
A “special relationship” exists between a hotel or motel and its guests that does not exist in a landlord-tenant relationship. An innkeeper must maintain the premises in a reasonably safe condition to protect a lodger from unreasonable risks of physical harm while on the premises. The innkeeper must use reasonable care to keep the hallways, passageways, stairways, and parking lot reasonably well lighted and free of obstructions or hazards. An innkeeper, however, generally cannot be held liable for a defective or dangerous condition of property that it did not own, possess, know about or control.
The innkeeper has a legal obligation to keep the room, furniture, rugs, and fixtures in a reasonably safe condition to prevent injury. A person may be injured if the hotel chair he sits on breaks, causing him to fall to the floor. Or a lighting fixture over the bed may come loose and fall on the lodger, causing serious injuries. The owner of a hotel or motel has a duty to periodically inspect the room and its contents to ensure they do not pose an unreasonable risk of harm to guests.
The innkeeper can be held legally responsible for violating safety codes, which results in injury to or death of a lodger. For instance, the law generally requires that hotels, motels, and the like have working smoke detectors in every room. If the proprietor does not make regular checks of the smoke detectors to ensure they are in working condition, a fire breaks out in the hotel or motel, and a sleeping lodger is not woken up because of a non-functioning smoke detector, the proprietor of the hotel or motel can be held legally responsible for the lodger’s death or injuries.
A fun-filled vacation can turn to tragedy when a hotel or motel guest uses the swimming pool and, because of something the proprietor did or failed to do, results in the drowning death of or serious injuries to the guest. Children are especially at risk of drowning in hotel and motel swimming pools. The owner of a hotel, motel, inn, and the like must comply with all applicable safety codes and can be held liable for any deaths or injuries resulting from his or her failure to do so. Above and beyond complying with safety ordinances requiring specific measures, the proprietor must also use due care to ensure that the swimming pool is reasonably safe in all respects.
Safety features that are required by law include a fence around the pool with a self-closing gate, the stationing of a lifeguard at the pool or posting a sign that says something to the effect of “No Lifeguard on Duty,” installing a cover over the drain that prevents a swimmer from getting his or her hand or foot caught in it, keeping the water clean so the entire pool can be seen, and providing sufficient safety equipment to rescue someone from the pool, among other things.
[...] deaths and injuries include the pool or Jacuzzi of an apartment complex, a fitness club, or a hotel or motel. Public pools are also frequently the site of drowning deaths or injuries. Parks that contain lakes [...]