Crawford v. Pacific Western Mobile Estates

Pacific Western (defendant) owned a trailer park with a fenced, locked sewage settlement tank resembling a swimming pool; when acquiring the park, its employees stacked leftover concrete support blocks against the tank's fence, inadvertently creating a staircase over it, despite knowing children played throughout the park. Six-year-old Mark Crawford climbed the blocks with other children and drowned in the tank; his parents (plaintiffs) sued, a jury awarded $30,000, but the trial court entered judgment notwithstanding the verdict for Pacific, and the Crawfords appealed.