Can a plaintiff recover damages from Respondent Respondent's failure to comply with section 27 'Change of Occupancy' section?

It is contended by appellant that, assuming it was under a duty to comply with the section requiring an automatic sprinkler system, respondents have shown no causal connection between the violation of that duty and their injuries. The question of proximate cause is one for the jury, and before an appellate court will reverse a judgment upon the ground of insufficiency of the evidence to support a finding of causal connection it must appear from the record that, accepting the full force of the evidence adduced, together with every inference favorable to the prevailing party which may be drawn therefrom, and excluding all evidence in conflict therewith, it still appears that the law precludes such prevailing party from recovering a judgment. The evidence must be construed most strongly against the losing party. Every favorable inference and presumption which may fairly be deduced from the evidence should be resolved in favor of the prevailing party. Lindsey v. De Vaux, 50 Cal.App.2d 445, 448, 123 P.2d 144, hearing denied. Just what would have happened in the present case had a sprinkler system been in operation is not capable of direct proof and must, of necessity, be largely a matter of speculation or of inference. And, even so, it has been held that the question is one for the jury, and not for the court.

Page 27

'Change of Occupancy' section: