When someone is injured as a result of unsafe property or building conditions, he may have a right to make a claim for damages against the owner of the property. In the past, a landowner's duty to protect an entrant on the land depended on how the entrant was classified. For instance, an entrant could be legally classified as a licensee or invitee. The landowner's duties were different for each type of entrant. In Nevada, however, these sorts of classifications have been largely eliminated in favor of a test as to whether an owner or landlord's conduct was reasonable under the circumstances.

Here is the portion of the Nevada Supreme Court's holding in which the old standards are eliminated:

                              [Only Part Of Decision Provided]

                                       MOODY v. MANNY'S

                                       110 Nev. 320 (1994)

In the district court, Manny's and Peress also moved for summary judgment based on the argument that Manny's, and Peress as owners and occupiers of land, owed no duty of care to Moody and, if they did, they did not violate any applicable standard of care. Manny's and Peress contend that Moody was a trespasser on the property, and therefore no duty of care was owed to Moody. In the past, we have stated that generally no duty is owed by the occupant of property to a trespasser, except "not to wantonly or willfully injure [the trespasser] or fail to exercise due care to prevent his injuries after his presence in a place of danger [is] discovered." Crosman v. Southern Pac. Co., 44 Nev. 286, 300, 194 P. 839, 843 (1921). Yet, the standard of care owed by owners and occupiers of land toward persons on that land has become rather murky in recent years.

Traditional landowner liability depended upon the status of the injured person as a trespasser, licensee, or invitee. See Early v. N.L.V. Casino Corp., 100 Nev. 200, 203, 678 P.2d 683, 684-85 (1984); Sierra Pac. Power Co. v. Rinehart, 99 Nev. 557, 560, 665 P.2d 270, 272 (1983); Brewer v. Annett, 86 Nev. 700, 702, 475 P.2d 607, 608 (1970). In 1985, however, in Turpel v. Sayles, 101 Nev. 35, 692 P.2d 1290 (1985), we adopted a doctrine of landowner liability for landlords independent of the status of the person injured on the land and free from the rigid categorization which has been a vestige of the early common law. In Turpel, the plaintiff was injured when she attempted to warn residents of a fire which had broken out in a condominium unit owned by the defendant. Id. at 35-36, 692 P.2d at 1290. The plaintiff alleged that her injuries were proximately caused by the defendant's failure to install smoke detectors in the condominium units. Id. at 36, 692 P.2d at 1290. The defendant moved for summary judgment on the sole ground that the plaintiff was a mere licensee, to whom the defendant owed no duty of due care, and the motion was granted. Id. In reversing the grant of summary judgment, we quoted the following passage from Sargent v. Ross, 113 N.H. 388, 308 A.2d 528, 534 (1973):

Henceforth, landlords as other persons must exercise reasonable care not to subject others to an unreasonable risk of harm. A landlord must act as a reasonable person under all of the circumstances including the likelihood of injury to others, the probable seriousness of such injuries, and the burden of reducing or avoiding the risk. We think this basic principle of responsibility for landlords as for others 'best expresses the principles of justice and reasonableness upon which our law of torts is founded.' The questions of control, hidden defects and common or public use, which formerly had to be established as a prerequisite to even considering the negligence of a landlord, will now be relevant only inasmuch as they bear on the basic tort issues such as the foreseeability and unreasonableness of the particular risk of harm. Turpel, 101 Nev. at 38, 692 P.2d at 1292. We concluded in Turpel:

In accord with those courts which have discerned no sound policy reason in the modern social context for retaining the ancient exception for landlords or property owners from the general application of the basic principles of tort law, we find no basis for excusing the landlord in this case from the requirement that she defend the allegation that she has, through her negligence, been the cause of foreseeable injuries to the plaintiff for which she should assume liability. Nor do we see a basis in policy for excluding this plaintiff from the benefits of the rescue doctrine, as they would be applied in any other tort case, solely on the ground that the allegedly negligent defendant is a property owner. Id. at 39, 692 P.2d at 1293.

In Turpel, we discussed Swift & Company v. Baldwin, 299 S.W.2d 157 (Tex.Civ.App.1957), in which the plaintiff was injured while attempting to secure a sign he feared would fall on school children. The defendant attempted to rely on the plaintiff's status as an invitee to avoid liability. Id. at 160. We made the following statement concerning Swift:

The [Swift ] court refused to apply the concept [of the status of the injured person] on the basis that "[w]e do not think the question of 'invitee' or 'licensee' or 'no duty' is involved in this case. We think the question presented here was whether or not the school children were in a position of peril, and whether or not the defendant acted as a man of ordinary prudence in going to their rescue." Turpel, 101 Nev. at 37, 692 P.2d at 1291 (quoting Swift, 299 S.W.2d at 160).

In 1986, in Galloway v. McDonalds Restaurants, 102 Nev. 534, 728 P.2d 826 (1986), we stated that the following jury instruction "embodies the law in Nevada as to the duty of landowners":

An owner or occupant of land must exercise ordinary care and prudence to render the premises reasonably safe for the visit of a person invited on his premises for business purposes. An owner or occupant of land who knows, or in the exercise of reasonable care should know, of their dangerous and unsafe condition, and who invites others to enter upon the property, owes to such invitees a duty to warn them of the danger, where the peril is hidden, latent, or concealed, or the invitees are without knowledge thereof. Id. at 537, 728 P.2d at 828.

One year after Turpel v. Sayles, 101 Nev. 35, 692 P.2d 1290 (1985), we allude to a doctrine of landowner liability based upon the injured person's status upon the premises. In Ross v. Carson Construction, 106 Nev. 885, 803 P.2d 657 (1990), we also indicated that the common law status of a person as a trespasser on another's property may affect the person's ability to recover for personal injuries, but we "elect [ed] not to reach the issue of [the plaintiff's] status under the common law landowner liability classifications." Id. at 888-89, 803 P.2d at 659.

1989, in Wright v. Schum, 105 Nev. 611, 781 P.2d 1142 (1989), we relied on Turpel. In Wright, a tenant's pit bull dog escaped from the tenant's yard and mauled a young boy. Id. at 612, 781 P.2d at 1142. The plaintiff brought an action against the owner/landlord of the property, but this action was dismissed. Id. We held that the defendant could not be held liable "as a landlord " or "by reason of his status as a landlord." Id. at 613, 781 P.2d at 1143. We stated in Wright:

In Turpel we observed correctly that merely because a person had the legal status of being an owner or landlord, such person did not enjoy immunity from tort liability. As put in Turpel, there is no reason to except "landlords or property owners from the general application of the basic principles of tort law." [The land owner], obviously, "as other persons must exercise reasonable care not to subject others to an unreasonable risk of harm."

The question in this case, then, is not whether [the land owner] is liable to [the mauled boy] as a landlord, but rather whether he is liable "as other persons" for the exercise of due care in not subjecting [the boy] to an unreasonable risk of harm. Id. at 613-14, 781 P.2d at 1143 (footnote omitted; citations omitted).

However, in a footnote in Wright, we analyzed Turpel as follows:
Obviously the duty to install smoke detectors is related to [the condominium owner's] status as an owner or landlord, and there would be no duty apart from this status; still, Turpel is not a case of "landlord liability"; it is, as stated in the Turpel opinion, one of general tort liability. Id. at 613 n. 1, 781 P.2d at 1143 n. 1.

We find the approach set forth in Turpel and those cases which follow it to be a more enlightened and equitable means for ascertaining liability. We therefore follow the lead of the California Supreme Court in Rowland v. Christian, 69 Cal.2d 108, 70 Cal.Rptr. 97, 443 P.2d 561 (1968), and abandon former principles of landowner liability based upon the status of the person injured on the premises, such as whether that person is a trespasser, licensee, or invitee. In Turpel, we stated:

"Common law rules defining a landowner's liability in negligence to people coming onto the land reflected the needs of an agrarian society," in which the "landowner was a petty sovereign within his boundaries," and "[t]he character of his duty to an injured party varied with the party's relationship with the sovereign," whether trespasser, licensee, invitee or tenant.

Turpel, 101 Nev. at 37-38, 692 P.2d at 1292 (quoting Young v. Garwacki, 380 Mass. 162, 402 N.E.2d 1045, 1047 (1980)). We also stated, "[A]s other courts have concluded, we are not satisfied that the traditional principles of property law are appropriately applied to analysis of a tort claim in a twentieth century urban residential setting." Turpel, 101 Nev. at 37, 692 P.2d at 1291.

In Rowland, the California Supreme Court rejected a rigid classfication system based on "status" in determining landowner liability.  Rowland, 70 Cal.Rptr. at  104, 443 P.2d at 568.  The court stated:

One of the areas where this court and other courts have departed from the fundamental concept that a man is liable for injuries caused by his carelessness is with regard to the liability of a possessor of land for injuries to persons who have entered upon that land.  It has been suggested that the special rules regarding liability of the possessor of land are due to historical considerations stemming from the high place which land has traditionally held in English and American though, the dominance and prestige of the landowning class in England during the formative period of the rules of governing the possessor's liability, and the heritage of feudalism.

The departure from the fundamental rule of liability for negligence has been accomplished by classifying the plaintiff either as a trespasser, licensee, or invitee and then adopting special rules as to the duty owed by the possessor to each of the classifications....

Id., 70 Cal.Rptr. at 100-01, 443 P.2d at 564-65 (citation omitted). The California Supreme Court recognized that rules of liability based upon the "status" of the plaintiff is neither strictly logical nor just. We find the following language from Rowland particularly persuasive:

A man's life or limb does not become less worthy of protection by the law nor a loss less worthy of compensation under the law because he has come upon the land of another without permission or with permission but without a business purpose. Reasonable people do not ordinarily vary their conduct depending upon such matters, and to focus upon the status of the injured party as a trespasser, licensee, or invitee in order to determine the question whether the landowner has a duty of care, is contrary to our modern social mores and humanitarian values. The common law rules obscure rather than illuminate the proper considerations which should govern determination of the question of duty.

Id., 70 Cal.Rptr. at 104, 443 P.2d at 568. Accordingly, the California Supreme Court saw fit to abandon such antiquated rules for determining liability, stating:

[W]e are satisfied that continued adherence to the common law distinctions can only lead to injustice or, if we are to avoid injustice, further fictions with the resulting complexity and confusion. We decline to follow and perpetuate such rigid classifications. The proper test to be applied to the liability of the possessor of land ... is whether in the management of his property he has acted as a reasonable man in view of the probability of injury to others, and, although the plaintiff's status as a trespasser, licensee, or invitee may in the light of the facts giving rise to such status have some bearing on the question of liability, the status is not determinative.

We discern no justification for continuing to adhere to rules of land owner and occupier liability based upon the artificial classification of plaintiffs as either trespassers, licensees, or invitees, and hinging recovery on this status. We conclude that all persons in this society have an obligation to act reasonably and that an owner or occupier of land should be held to the general duty of reasonable care when another is injured on that land. While a reasonable person would take greater precautions to protect from harm's way one invited onto his or her premises than he or she would to protect a trespasser, the status of the injured party may not be the dispositive factor. Rather, determinations of liability should primarily depend upon whether the owner or occupier of land acted reasonably under the circumstances. In the instant case, Moody's recovery should depend on the reasonableness of the use of the cable barrier under the circumstances rather than the status of Moody as a trespasser, licensee, or invitee at the time of the injury.

We hold that the district court erred in ordering summary judgment against Moody. We conclude, as a matter of law, that neither the firefighter's rule nor > NRS 41.139 bars Moody's suit for personal injuries. We further conclude that there remains a genuine issue of material fact as to whether Manny's and Peress acted reasonably under the circumstances in erecting, or allowing to be erected, a cable barrier across the parking lot. Since, following Peress's dismissal from the action, Peress was rejoined in the litigation by Manny's as a third-party defendant, we conclude that any contentions as to Peress's dismissal are moot and we decline to address them further.

We have considered all other contentions on appeal and we conclude that they either lack merit or need not be addressed in light of this disposition. Accordingly, we reverse the order of the district court granting summary judgment against Moody and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

Business Premises and Security

A business owner has a duty to provide a safe place for guests and customers to visit. Claims against companies for injuries resulting from criminal violence against guests and customers have increased dramatically over the past 10 years. Because the perpetrator of a rape, armed robbery, or murder is often not apprehended (or even if he is apprehended, he is usually "judgment proof"), victims frequently seek compensation for their injuries from a business owner.

A landowner's duty may arise when the criminal conduct of a third party is the foreseeable result of a landowner's negligence. When criminal conduct of a third party is foreseeable, the landowner has a duty to prevent injuries arising from such conduct. A landowner or business owner must provide reasonable security. Expert witnesses are often used to evaluate and testify with respect to the issue of what constitutes reasonable security.