Maryland Arms Limited Partnership, Plaintiff-Respondent-Petitioner v. Cari M. Connell and Linda J. Connell

Summary

The Wisconsin Supreme Court held that the second sentence of the liability paragraph in Maryland Arms' residential lease, making the lessee liable for all damage to the premises 'in any way caused by the acts' of the lessee, is ambiguous as applied to fire damage caused by the tenant's non-negligent acts of bringing a hair dryer into her apartment and plugging it in, because the landlord's 'control' theory reads in language found nowhere in the lease and because that reading would render the preceding sentence covering intentional and negligent acts or breaches mere surplusage. Construing the ambiguity against the landlord-drafter, the court adopted the tenant's reading that the 'acts' in the second sentence refer to the intentional or negligent acts and lease breaches identified in the first sentence, and concluded the lease does not unambiguously make Connell liable for the accidental fire damage. Because the lease construction was dispositive, the court declined to decide whether a lease provision assigning liability for non-negligent acts would contravene Wis. Stat. § 704.07, and it affirmed the court of appeals' result while modifying its statutory analysis. Justice Ziegler concurred to emphasize that parties remain free to allocate liability by contract if done clearly, while Justice Prosser dissented, contending the lease unambiguously imposes liability on the tenant under a substantial-factor causation test.