ABIGAIL VASQUEZ, a Minor, etc., et al., Plaintiffs and Appellants, v. RESIDENTIAL INVESTMENTS, INC., et al., Defendants and Respondents. , 118 Cal. App. 4th 269

A jealous boyfriend broke into the apartment of his estranged girlfriend and murdered her. Plaintiffs alleged that the negligence of the owners in not replacing the missing windowpane substantially contributed to the decedent's death by expediting the murderer's entry into the apartment. The trial court entered summary judgment for the owners, holding that the subject incident was not sufficiently foreseeable to give rise to a duty on the owners to prevent the murderer from entering the apartment. On appeal, the court reversed. The court held that the owners owed plaintiffs a duty to make reasonable efforts to restore the protections that an intact front door would have provided with replacement of the missing windowpane. The court stated that the degree of foreseeability of a criminal intruder by the owners was sufficiently high, compared with the burden of the duty proposed by plaintiffs to replace the windowpane, to support imposition of a duty on the owners. Additionally, the court...