Court Grants Summary Judgment in Mall Slip-and-Fall Case Over Trivial Tile Height Difference

A Pennsylvania trial court granted summary judgment in favor of the defendant in a slip-and-fall case at a mall. The plaintiff, who tripped over a raised tile, presented photographs showing a slight height difference between tiles but failed to provide evidence that the irregularity was significant enough to create a dangerous condition. The court ruled that the height difference was too trivial to support a claim, noting that the plaintiff’s fall could have been caused by other factors, such as tripping on her shoe, rather than the minor tile defect.

The plaintiff tripped and fell on a raised tile of the floor as she walked in a mall. She presented photographs showing a raised tile in the area where she fell, and she claimed that she tripped over either the photographed tile or a similar tile. She also admitted that she did not know exactly where she fell. 

The defendant filed a motion for summary judgment, arguing that to the extent the plaintiff’s photographs show a slight height difference between the floor tiles, the difference was too trivial to be deemed a dangerous condition. 

In analyzing the photographs, the trial court noted a ruler was stationed “in the grout line between the two tiles” and the “imperial measurement is below the ‘0’ inch line” and the “metric measurement is at the ‘1’ millimeter line.” The trial court held that “[s]urely as a matter of law, liability cannot be predicated on such a trivial irregularity, if it is an irregularity at all considering the grout lines generally sit below tile level.” 

The trial court ruled that “given the de minims height difference between the grouted tiles pictured in [the plaintiff’s] photographs, and even assuming there were multiple similar tile-height differences in the area where [the plaintiff] fell, the evidence fairly suggests that it is just as likely that [the plaintiff] tripped over the grip of her own shoe on tile, rather than by catching her foot on the edge of a raised tile, for [the plaintiff] would have to walk with her feet so near the ground in either case, that each is equally plausible.” 

As such, the trial court granted the defendant’s motion for summary judgment. 

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