A property owner cannot be held responsible for all accidents that happen on her property. This has now been decided by the Frankfurt am Main Higher Regional Court (OLG, Ref. 17 W 17/22). In this case, a neighbor walked across a rain-soaked stone path covered with leaves and branches to the owner's terrace to talk to her. On the way back, she fell and suffered a pubic, sitting and sacral fracture.
She therefore demanded 20,000 euros in damages and compensation for pain and suffering from the owner and also wanted legal aid. The application for legal aid was already rejected by the Regional Court. The appeal against this before the Higher Regional Court was also unsuccessful. It is true that the owner is responsible for the duty to ensure road safety. However, not every abstract danger must be countered preventively.
"A general ban on not endangering others would be utopian," emphasizes the OLG. Only those safety precautions must be taken "which a reasonable, prudent, careful and conscientious member of the public concerned may consider sufficient to protect other people from harm and which are reasonable in the circumstances", according to the OLG. In the event of an accident that cannot be ruled out, but which occurs "under particularly peculiar and remote circumstances", the injured party must pay for the damage themselves.
Source: ordentliche-gerichtsbarkeit.hessen.de/Az. 17 W 17/22
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