## Facts

- A steel company owned deteriorating residential parcels near its plant, including an abandoned house and outbuildings with scattered debris and an ash pit.
- Neighborhood children frequently played on the premises, and evidence indicated the owner knew or should have known of their presence.
- A four-year-old child was playing near the ash pit and tugged on a saw protruding from it; the saw came loose and severely injured his eye, causing permanent harm.
- The child’s brothers had earlier been on a nearby shed roof throwing rocks and glass toward an alley; they testified several minutes passed before they heard the child cry and found him bleeding near the ash pit.
- Evidence was introduced that cleaning up the owner’s similar properties would cost about $55,000 total (about $200 per parcel), and the owner intended eventually to raze the structures.

## Issues

1. Whether the owner owed a duty to protect child trespassers from dangerous conditions on abandoned, debris-strewn premises under Illinois child-trespasser/attractive-nuisance principles.
2. Whether the evidence supported a reasonable inference that the saw in the ash pit proximately caused the eye injury, rather than thrown rocks or glass.
3. Whether the jury could find the risk of serious harm to children outweighed the burden and expense of reasonable precautions (e.g., cleanup, securing, or removal).
4. Whether the trial court erred in permitting a young child witness to testify and in admitting cleanup-cost evidence and certain post-accident measures for a limited purpose.

## Decision

- The appellate court affirmed the judgment on the jury verdict for the plaintiff ($115,000).
- The evidence supported submitting to the jury whether the owner should have anticipated child trespassers and whether the premises posed an unreasonable risk to them.
- Causation was for the jury; the circumstances permitted a reasonable inference that the saw caused the injury.
- The trial court did not abuse its discretion in finding the child witness competent.
- Evidence of cleanup cost and certain post-accident actions was admissible for the limited purpose of showing feasibility and the burden of precautions, not as direct proof of negligence.

## Legal Principles

- A landowner may be liable for harm to child trespassers when it knows or has reason to know children are likely to trespass, a condition creates an unreasonable risk of serious harm, and the burden of eliminating the danger is slight compared to the risk.
- Proximate cause may be proven by circumstantial evidence; a verdict stands if the evidence allows a reasonable inference of causation and the issue is properly for the jury.
- Child witness competency is determined case by case; no fixed age controls, and the trial judge has discretion based on the child’s ability to perceive, recall, understand questions, answer intelligently, and appreciate the duty to tell the truth.
- Evidence of subsequent remedial measures is not admissible to prove negligence, but may be admitted for a limited, non-negligence purpose such as feasibility or burden of precautions when relevant and appropriately limited.

## Conclusion

The court upheld a jury finding that an owner of abandoned, debris-littered property could be liable for a young child’s injury where children’s presence was foreseeable, the risk of serious harm was unreasonable relative to the cost of precautions, causation could reasonably be inferred from the circumstances, and the challenged evidentiary rulings fell within the trial court’s discretion.


Dallas v. Granite City Steel Co., 64 Ill. App. 2d 409, 211 N.E.2d 907 (Ill. App. Ct. 1965)