IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
_____________________
No. 97-60182
_____________________
FRANCES LOUISE SANDERS;
PAUL SANDERS,
Plaintiffs-Appellees,
versus
WAL-MART STORES, INC., doing
business as Wal-Mart, Store #0391,
Defendant-Appellant.
_______________________________________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Mississippi
(1:96-CV-2-SAA)
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April 20, 1999
Before REAVLEY, POLITZ and SMITH, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:*
The judgment of the district court is affirmed for the following reasons:
1. Reflectors, raised an inch or higher above a driveway across which
customers walk to their cars with bags of merchandise in their hands, are not necessarily
expected and acceptable conditions to be encountered by invitees of a business. The jury
*
Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the Court has determined that this opinion should not be
published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR. R.
47.5.4.
was entitled to find the defendant negligent because of its failure to provide reasonably
safe premises. See Tharp v. Bunge Corp., 641 So.2d 20 (Miss. 1994).
2. The jury was also entitled to find the plaintiff contributorily negligent. She
was a frequent customer of the defendant and had seen the reflectors many times.
Richard v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 702 So.2d 79 (La. App. 2 cir. 1977), does not afford the
plaintiff the help claimed. Not only is it a Louisiana case, but the facts are very different.
The plaintiff there stumbled on bolts protruding from the Wal-Mart sidewalk. She was
walking by a display of merchandise and she could not reasonably anticipate the bolts.
3. The disclosure of the subsequent removal of the reflectors was not blatant
disobedience of the court’s order and, with the court’s instruction, it was harmless.
4. The other points of error raised by Wal-Mart are either its arguments about
the evidence or are directed at rulings of the court within its discretion.
AFFIRMED.
2