Premises Liability and Children

Typically, when we’re classifying people who enter land in a premises liability claim. Trespassers are the individuals or the classification that is given the least duty by the landowner. Landowner has the least responsibilities to making safe hazards and warning them of hazards. There is an exception to trespassing children. The idea behind that is that children are often attracted to hazardous conditions on property. Call this an attractive nuisance doctrine. An example might be an abandoned swimming pool, something along those lines. The children are going to enter the property to inspect and to play in and do things of that nature. If children do wander on the property, property owners have a duty to exercise ordinary care to avoid reasonably foreseeable risks of harm to children. Those are only if the harm is caused by an artificial condition on the land. That means something that is created or constructed on the land versus some natural formation, for instance if your property has a lot of canyons in it and something along those lines. In those events, you’ll want to meet with an experienced lawyer who can advise you about this attractive nuisance doctrine and look at whether the property owner did properly inspect for these potential hazards to attract children and whether you may have a claim.