In Elhorin v. Western Beef, Inc., the court denied defendants’ summary judgment motion seeking dismissal of plaintiff’s personal injury slip-and-fall lawsuit.
Plaintiff alleged that he sustained injuries when he slipped and fell on a piece of cardboard on the floor of defendant’s supermarket. As is common in these cases, defendant argued that it did not have actual notice or constructive notice of the condition.
In reaching its decision, the court held;
Here, plaintiff testified that a manager told him that prior to his incident he had told a worker to remove the piece of cardboard from the floor, evidencing actual knowledge prior to the accident. A manager has the authority to bind its employer by an admission made as agent on behalf of the employer. The
alleged statements of the store manager, although hearsay, fall within the principal/agent admission exception and are, therefore, competent evidence on the issue of whether defendant supermarket had actual notice. Assuming that defendant met its burden of proof on the motion, plaintiff submitted sufficient admissible evidence which demonstrated the existence of triable issues of fact.