## Facts

- Aaron Baker entered a Taco Bell in Newburgh, Indiana to buy a soft drink and felt nauseous.
- After paying at the counter, Baker suddenly fell backward, struck his head, lost consciousness, and convulsed.
- The parties disputed Taco Bell’s immediate response after the first collapse:
  - Baker alleged no employee called for medical help or assisted him.
  - Taco Bell alleged an employee checked on him and offered to call an ambulance, which Baker refused.
- Shortly after Baker stood up, he fell a second time, this time forward, again losing consciousness.
- The second fall caused a chin laceration, loss of four front teeth, and a cracked cervical vertebra.
- After regaining consciousness, Baker choked on blood and teeth, left the restaurant, and obtained help from a friend and his fiancé to get to the hospital.
- Baker sued Taco Bell’s owners/operators for negligence and alleged aggravated misconduct; the trial court granted summary judgment to Taco Bell on the ground it owed no duty because it did not cause the medical episode.

## Issues

1. Whether a business that holds its premises open to the public owes a duty to take reasonable action to aid or protect a customer who becomes ill and unconscious on the premises when the business did not cause the initial medical emergency.
2. Whether factual disputes about the steps taken after the first collapse precluded summary judgment on breach and causation.

## Decision

- The Indiana Court of Appeals reversed the summary judgment and remanded.
- The court held Taco Bell owed Baker an affirmative duty to take reasonable steps to aid or protect him after he collapsed, even if Taco Bell did not cause the initial medical condition.
- Because the record contained competing accounts of Taco Bell’s response after the first fall, breach and causation presented triable fact questions.

## Legal Principles

- A possessor of land that holds premises open to the public has a special-relationship-based duty to take reasonable action to aid or protect business invitees who are ill or injured on the premises.
- This duty includes reasonable measures such as summoning medical assistance and protecting the invitee from further harm until care can be obtained from others.
- The duty does not require employees to provide professional medical treatment or to undertake actions that pose unreasonable risk to themselves.
- The duty arises from the relationship between business and invitee, not from the business’s responsibility for creating the initial peril.
- When a duty exists as a matter of law, disputed facts about the reasonableness of the defendant’s response generally bar summary judgment on breach and causation.

## Conclusion

A business open to the public must take reasonable steps to assist and protect an invitee who becomes ill or unconscious on the premises, regardless of fault for the initial emergency, and factual disputes about the adequacy of the response required reversal of summary judgment.


Baker v. Fenneman & Brown Props., L.L.C., 793 N.E.2d 1203 (Ind. Ct. App. 2003)