## Facts

- Trammell Crow Central Texas, Ltd. managed the Quarry Market, an open-air shopping center in San Antonio with a movie theater and parking areas.
- Around 12:30 a.m., Luis Gutierrez and his pregnant wife, Karol, left the theater and walked toward their car.
- A masked shooter dressed in black fired multiple shots from behind at some distance, striking Luis four times; he died at the hospital, and the assailant was never identified.
- The property used off-duty police officers for security; one officer patrolled in an unmarked vehicle and had earlier observed two people in dark clothing near the theater entrance.
- In roughly the two years before the shooting, the property experienced numerous property crimes and some assaults, robberies, and a weapons offense, but no prior homicides.
- Plaintiffs alleged negligent security (including patrol placement and presence near theater closing) and claimed the crime history made the murder foreseeable.
- Trammell Crow argued violent crime at the property was relatively low compared to the city and that the killing was a targeted, retaliatory act unrelated to general premises conditions.

## Issues

1. Whether a premises manager owed a duty to protect an invitee from a third party’s fatal shooting based on prior criminal activity at the premises.
2. Whether the prior crimes made the murder sufficiently unreasonable and foreseeable under the Timberwalk factors to impose a negligent-security duty.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of Texas reversed the court of appeals and rendered judgment that plaintiffs take nothing.
- The court held Trammell Crow owed no duty to protect Luis Gutierrez from the shooting because the murder was not sufficiently foreseeable under the governing premises-liability standard for third-party crimes.
- Applying Timberwalk, the court found the prior crime history—dominated by property crimes and lesser violent incidents—was not similar to a masked, ambush-style murder and did not justify imposing a duty.
- Because the case was resolved on duty, the court did not reach an extended analysis of proximate cause.

## Legal Principles

- Landowners generally have no duty to protect invitees from third-party criminal acts; a duty arises only in a narrow set of circumstances.
- Under Timberwalk Apartments, Partners, Inc. v. Cain, a duty exists only when the risk of criminal conduct is both unreasonable and foreseeable.
- Foreseeability is assessed using the factors of proximity, recency, frequency, similarity, and publicity of prior crimes.
- Similarity of prior crimes to the complained-of crime is central; a record of property crimes and lower-level violence does not, without more, make an extraordinary homicide foreseeable.
- Even where some criminal risk exists, courts consider the policy consequences of converting premises owners into insurers against rare, extreme criminal acts.

## Conclusion

The Texas Supreme Court held that the Quarry Market’s prior criminal history did not make an execution-style, masked shooting sufficiently unreasonable and foreseeable to impose a negligent-security duty, so the premises-liability claim failed as a matter of law.


Trammell Crow Cent. Tex., Ltd. v. Gutierrez, 267 S.W.3d 9 (Tex. 2008)