Lakisha DeVaughn v. StoneMor Partners, L.P., No. 578, September Term, 2025. Opinion by Nazarian, J.
TORTS – NEGLIGENCE – PREMISES LIABILITY – RECREATIONAL USE
STATUTE
The circuit court abused its discretion when it denied the plaintiff’s motion to reconsider the dismissal of her complaint on the ground that Maryland Code (2000, 2023 Repl. Vol., 2024 Cum. Supp.), §§ 5-1101 to 5-1109 of the Natural Resources Article, Maryland’s Recreational Use Statute, barred her negligence claim against the owner of a cemetery where she tripped in a ditch and was injured while visiting her son’s gravesite. Although the decision to grant or deny a revisory motion under Maryland Rule 2-534 is committed ordinarily to the circuit court’s discretion, here, the circuit court applied the incorrect legal test to determine whether the Recreational Use Statute relieved the cemetery owner of any liability for the plaintiff’s injury. For the Recreational Use Statute to apply in this case under the test articulated by the Supreme Court of Maryland in Mayor and City Council of Baltimore v. Wallace, 492 Md. 349 (2025), the circuit court must determine first that the area of the cemetery where the plaintiff was injured is one that the owner intended to be used primarily for recreational or educational—not commercial—purposes and second that the plaintiff was using that area of the cemetery for recreational or educational purposes when she was injured.
Circuit Court for Prince George’s County
Case No. C-16-CV-24-005457
REPORTED
IN THE APPELLATE COURT
OF MARYLAND
No. 578
September Term, 2025
LAKISHA DEVAUGHN
v.
STONEMOR PARTNERS, L.P.
Nazarian,
Zic,
Beachley, Donald E.,
(Senior Judge, Specially Assigned),
JJ.
Opinion by Nazarian, J.
Filed: July 30, 2026
Pursuant to the Maryland Uniform Electronic Legal
Materials Act (§§ 10-1601 et seq. of the State
Government Article) this document is authentic.
2026.07.30
13:53:27 -04'00'
Gregory Hilton, Clerk
This case involves the application of Maryland Code (2000, 2023 Repl. Vol., 2024
Cum. Supp.), §§ 5-1101 to 5-1109 of the Natural Resources Article (“NR”), known
commonly as Maryland’s “Recreational Use Statute,” to a claim of negligence against the
owner and operator of a cemetery for alleged injuries sustained by a visitor to the premises.
StoneMor Partners, L.P. (“StoneMor”) is the owner and operator of Lincoln
Memorial Cemetery (the “Cemetery”) in Suitland and holds the Cemetery open to the
public. In November 2024, Lakisha DeVaughn filed a complaint against StoneMor in the
Circuit Court for Prince George’s County, alleging that she tripped in a ditch on Cemetery
grounds during an April 2024 visit to her son’s gravesite and sustained serious injuries due
to StoneMor’s failure to maintain the grounds in a safe condition. StoneMor responded to
the complaint with a motion to dismiss, and after Ms. DeVaughn’s failure to file a timely
opposition, the circuit court dismissed her complaint. Ms. DeVaughn filed a motion to
reconsider and the court denied that motion, on the merits, on the grounds that under the
Recreational Use Statute, StoneMor owed her no duty to maintain the Cemetery grounds.
On appeal, Ms. DeVaughn argues that the circuit court erred in finding that the
Recreational Use Statute barred her negligence claim. We agree and reverse and remand
for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
I. BACKGROUND
On November 11, 2024, Ms. DeVaughn filed a complaint against StoneMor seeking
to recover in negligence for injuries she sustained during a visit to her son’s gravesite on
April 18, 2024. Ms. DeVaughn alleged that she buried her son in 2021 and that she visits
the Cemetery once or twice annually to honor his memory and attend his gravesite. On this occasion, she alleged that while walking around her son’s gravesite, she stepped into a
concealed ditch and suffered serious bodily harm. According to Ms. DeVaughn, the ditch
was hidden “because of poor upkeep in the area” around her son’s gravesite and her injury
was the direct and proximate result of StoneMor’s negligence in maintaining the premises.
She alleged that StoneMor knows and expects that people will visit gravesites on Cemetery
property, advertises the Cemetery as a “historical venue reflecting the history of AfricanAmericans in the United States,” and has a duty to ensure that the Cemetery grounds are
safe and hazard-free for visitors to its gravesites. StoneMor breached its duty of care, she
alleged, by failing to inspect the Cemetery grounds for possible hazards or to remediate
known hazards, failing to warn visitors of known or potential hazards, and “otherwise
failing to maintain the gravesite in a reasonable manner.” Ms. DeVaughn sought
compensatory damages.
StoneMor moved to dismiss the complaint under Maryland Rule 2-322(b) for failure
to state a claim. It asserted that under the Recreational Use Statute,1 it owed visitors to the
Cemetery no legal duty to warn them of hazards, to inspect the Cemetery grounds, or to
maintain the gravesites. Because it owed Ms. DeVaughn no duty of care, and because a
plaintiff must prove the existence of a duty of care to prevail on a claim of negligence,
StoneMor contended, Ms. DeVaughn failed to state a claim upon which relief could be
granted. StoneMor asked the circuit court to dismiss the complaint with prejudice.
1
As we explain below, when a landowner opens their land to the public for a “recreational and educational purpose,” the Recreational Use Statute limits that landowner’s liability to anyone who enters their land for such purpose. See NR § 5-1102(b).
2
Ms. DeVaughn failed to respond to StoneMor’s motion within fifteen days of
service as required under Maryland Rule 2-311(b), and the circuit court granted the motion
as unopposed on January 17, 2025. On January 22, Ms. DeVaughn filed a motion to
reconsider and attached an opposition to StoneMor’s motion to dismiss. In her opposition,
she asserted that the Recreational Use Statute only limits landowners’ liability to members
of the public, not to business invitees. She asserted further that she was a business invitee
of StoneMor because she had purchased a gravesite at the Cemetery for her son. Because
she was a business invitee and because she did not visit the Cemetery for a “recreational or
educational purpose,” she argued, the Recreational Use Statute didn’t bar her claim.
StoneMor opposed Ms. DeVaughn’s motion to reconsider. On February 25, the
court ordered a hearing on the motion, and the parties appeared for the hearing on April
11, 2025. After hearing the parties’ arguments, the court found that Ms. DeVaughn had
entered the Cemetery on the day of her alleged injury free of charge. The court concluded
that StoneMor owed Ms. DeVaughn no duty of care under the Recreational Use Statute
and denied her motion to reconsider. The court entered an order denying Ms. DeVaughn’s
motion on April 28, 2025, and on May 19, 2025, Ms. DeVaughn noted this timely appeal.
II. DISCUSSION
Ms. DeVaughn presents one question for our review, which we rephrase: Did the
circuit court err in denying her motion to reconsider its grant of StoneMor’s motion to
dismiss her complaint on the grounds that under the Recreational Use Statute, StoneMor
owed her no duty to keep the Cemetery safe for entry or use or to warn her of potentially
3
hazardous conditions on the premises?2
The Maryland Rules don’t provide for a “motion to reconsider,” but parties file them
all the time and all the same under the authority of other Rules. One of these is Maryland
Rule 2-534, which permits a party, within ten days after entry of judgment, to file a motion
to alter or amend the judgment. In re Jacobson, 256 Md. App. 369, 404 (2022) (citing Md.
Rule 2-534). The decision to grant or deny such a motion is committed to the circuit court’s
discretion, and an appellate court will reverse the denial of a Rule 2-534 motion only for
an abuse of that discretion. Schlotzhauer v. Morton, 224 Md. App. 72, 84 (2015) (citation
omitted), aff’d, 449 Md. 217 (2016); Morton v. Schlotzhauer, 449 Md. 217, 231 (2016)
(citing Wilson-X v. Dep’t of Hum. Res., 403 Md. 667, 674–75 (2008)). “Nevertheless, a
‘court’s discretion is always tempered by the requirement that the court correctly apply the
law applicable to the case.’” Schlotzhauer, 224 Md. App. at 84 (quoting Arrington v. State,
411 Md. 524, 552 (2009)). “[C]ourts ‘do not have discretion to apply inappropriate legal
standards, even when making decisions that are regarded as discretionary in nature.’”
Morton, 449 Md. at 231 (quoting Wilson-X, 403 Md. at 674–75). “Thus, an error in
applying the law can constitute an abuse of discretion, even in the context of a motion for
2
Ms. DeVaughn phrased her Question Presented as follows: “Did the trial court err by
dismissing [Ms.] DeVaughn’s claims under Section 5-1101, et seq, of the Natural
Resources Article of the Annotated Code of Maryland?”
StoneMor’s brief phrased the Question Presented as follows: “Whether the circuit court
properly dismissed Appellant’s negligence claim under Maryland’s Recreational Use
Statute, Md. Code. Ann., Nat. Res. §§ 5-1101, et seq., where Appellant was not charged
a fee and the cemetery was open to the public for recreational and educational
purposes.”
4
reconsideration made pursuant to Maryland Rule 2-534.” Id. at 232.
This case comes to us on a less common posture, and one that reflects generosity on
the part of the circuit court. The circuit court granted StoneMor’s motion to dismiss
originally based on Ms. DeVaughn’s failure to oppose it, not on the merits. When Ms.
DeVaughn moved to reconsider, she didn’t offer any reason for her failure to file a timely
opposition—she asked the circuit court for a do-over on the merits. Had the court denied
Ms. DeVaughn’s Rule 2-534 motion by reiterating that she hadn’t opposed StoneMor’s
motion to dismiss on time or offered a compelling reason for failing to do so, we would be
hard-pressed to find that the denial was an abuse of the court’s discretion.
Indeed, Ms. DeVaughn reaped the benefits of an act of judicial grace. The circuit
court decided, when it didn’t have to, to exercise its discretion to allow Ms. DeVaughn the
opportunity to raise her merits argument on reconsideration, then denied her motion on the
(merits) ground that the Recreational Use Statute absolved StoneMor of any duty to her,
not on procedural grounds. Normally, a party challenging the denial of a motion to
reconsider on a ground not raised in connection with the original motion faces a steep
standard of review on appeal: the only question for us is whether the court abused its
discretion in deciding not to change its mind on reconsideration about a discretionary
decision—abuse of discretion squared. Wilson-X, 403 Md. at 674–75 (“[T]he ruling on a
motion for reconsideration is ordinarily discretionary, and . . . the standard of review in
such a circumstance is whether the court abused its discretion in denying the motion.”).
But in this instance, the court denied the motion to reconsider on purely legal grounds, and
because we hold that the court applied the incorrect legal standard when it determined that
5
StoneMor didn’t owe Ms. DeVaughn any duty of care under the Recreational Use Statute,
we end up holding that the court abused its discretion in denying the motion. And as a
result, we reverse the judgment and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with
this opinion.
Section 5-1102 of the Recreational Use Statute announces the statute’s purpose: “to
encourage any owner of land to make land . . . available to the public for any recreational
and educational purpose . . . by limiting the owner’s liability toward any person who enters
on land . . . for these purposes.” NR § 5-1102(b). To accomplish this goal, the statute
provides that “an owner of land owes no duty of care to keep the premises safe for entry or
use by others for any recreational or educational purpose” or to warn others who enter their
land for such purposes of any dangerous conditions on the premises. NR § 5-1103. The
statute states as well that a landowner who invites or permits others to use their land for
any recreational or educational purpose without charge doesn’t “[e]xtend any assurance
that the premises are safe for any purpose.” NR § 5-1104. Further, the statute provides that
a landowner doesn’t confer the legal status of invitee or licensee to whom a duty of care is
owed on any member of the public entering the land for any recreational or educational
purpose. Id. Nor does the landowner assume responsibility or incur liability for any injury
to an entrant on the land for such purpose if the injury is due to the entrant’s act or omission.
Id. The statute defines “[r]ecreational purpose” as “any recreational pursuit,” NR § 5-1101(g), and the statutory definition of “[e]ducational purpose” includes “[o]bservation of
historical, archaeological, or scientific sites.” NR § 5-1101(c)(6). Finally, the Recreational
Use Statute doesn’t limit a landowner’s liability for injury suffered by a person from whom
6
the landowner collected a charge or fee as a condition to entering the land. NR § 5-1106(a).3
In summary, the Recreational Use Statute protects owners of private land who make
the land available to the general public for recreational or educational use by limiting their
liability for injuries due to unsafe conditions on the land. Fagerhus v. Host Marriott Corp.,
143 Md. App. 525, 540 (2002); Martinez v. Ross, 245 Md. App. 581, 597 (2020) (holding
that the Recreational Use Statute protects only those who make land available to the general
public, not those who open their land to social guests only). The statute “covers all ‘nonpaying’ recreational and educational users, without regard to how they might otherwise be
‘categorized’ under common law.” Fagerhus, 143 Md. App. at 540; see Martinez, 245 Md.
App. at 588 (noting that “[a]t common law, when persons are injured while on the property
of another, their legal status dictates the scope of an owner’s duties to them” and explaining
the common law categories of “invitee” (to whom a landowner owes “the highest duty”),
“social guest” or “licensee by invitation” (to whom they owe a lesser duty), and “bare
licensee” or “trespasser” (to whom they owe the least duty) (citations omitted)).
This case involves a new test of how the Recreational Use Statute applies, in this
instance to cemeteries. There’s no dispute that the Cemetery is private property, nor that
the public can access the Cemetery. But the Cemetery is available for different uses, some
that are recreational or educational and some that aren’t. StoneMor argues for a broad
3
The Recreational Use Statute also does not limit a landowner’s liability for a “[w]illful
or malicious failure” to warn entrants of a dangerous condition on their land. NR § 5-1106(a). Ms. DeVaughn hasn’t alleged that her injury was the product of any willful or
malicious conduct by StoneMor.
7
application of the statute, that the fact that it opens the Cemetery to the public for
recreational or educational uses at all confers blanket immunity from premises liability.
Ms. DeVaughn argues that she wasn’t there for recreational or educational purposes, but
as a business invitee, and that any immunity to which StoneMor might be entitled shouldn’t
apply to her.
Ultimately, Ms. DeVaughn prevails, but for a somewhat different reason than she
argues. In the time since the circuit court decided the motions in this case, our Supreme
Court issued its opinion in Mayor and City Council of Baltimore v. Wallace (Wallace II),
492 Md. 349 (2025), and provided the analytical framework for deciding the contours of
the Recreational Use Statute. In Wallace II, the Court clarified that whether the
Recreational Use Statute relieves a landowner of liability for the injuries of a particular
user doesn’t depend on the user’s subjective purpose for entering the land. Id. at 366–67,
370–71. That case involved a cyclist who was injured when a defect in the bricks of the
Inner Harbor Park promenade in Baltimore City caused her to fall from her bicycle. Id. at
353. The cyclist sued the City and alleged that the City was negligent for failing to maintain
the promenade or to warn her of the defect that caused her fall. Id. The City argued that the
Recreational Use Statute barred the cyclist’s claim, but the circuit court disagreed. Id. at
353–54. The circuit court found that the Recreational Use Statute didn’t apply because the
cyclist was commuting from work when she was injured, not using the promenade for
recreational purposes. Id. at 354. We affirmed, but for a different reason: we held that the
Recreational Use Statute didn’t bar the cyclist’s claim because the promenade where she
was injured serves “as a public connecter to other parts of [Baltimore] City” and not as
8
land the City made available for recreational purposes. Mayor & City Council of Baltimore
v. Wallace (Wallace I), 260 Md. App. 388, 410, 416 (2024), aff’d, 492 Md. 349 (2025).
The Supreme Court affirmed. Wallace II, 492 Md. at 355, 372. The Court
acknowledged that the promenade “is part of the City’s transportation system and, as such,
is used not only for recreational bicycling but also for commuting and other transportation
purposes.” Id. at 357. The Supreme Court agreed with the City that the cyclist’s subjective
purpose for riding her bike on the promenade—i.e., whether she was “riding for fun or for
business purposes”—was irrelevant to the question of whether the Recreational Use Statute
barred her negligence claim. Id. at 366–67. Instead, the Court explained, “the applicability
of the Recreational Use Statute [depends] on what [a] user was doing on the property” at
the time they were injured, “but not why they were doing it.” Id. at 370–71. Under that
standard, the Court held that the Recreational Use Statute didn’t relieve the City of liability
for the cyclist’s injuries. Id. at 371. Because the City had made the promenade available to
the public for transportation purposes, and because cycling was a transportation-related use
of the promenade, the Court reasoned, the Recreational Use Statute didn’t apply to the
cyclist’s claim even though cycling “also constitutes a recreational activity.” Id.
In this case, Ms. DeVaughn argues that the circuit court erred when it found that the
Recreational Use Statute barred her negligence claim against StoneMor. She asserts on
appeal, as she did in her motion to reconsider the circuit court’s decision to grant
StoneMor’s motion to dismiss, that she was a business invitee of StoneMor at the time she
was injured and that the Recreational Use Statute doesn’t apply to business invitees. Ms.
DeVaughn argues that StoneMor “is in the business of selling gravesites,” that she became
9
StoneMor’s customer when she purchased a gravesite at the Cemetery for her son, and that
StoneMor expects that those who purchase burial plots at the Cemetery for their loved ones
will visit the plots to honor and remember them. She contends that because she was “a
customer of StoneMor engaged in the exact behavior anticipated by their commercial
transaction,” she was a business invitee at the time of her injury and was not using the
premises for recreational or educational purposes. And because the Recreational Use
Statute only limits landowners’ liability to non-paying members of the general public who
use their land for such purposes, she concludes, the statute does not bar her claim.
StoneMor counters that the statute relieves it of any liability it may have had for Ms.
DeVaughn’s injuries because (1) it holds the Cemetery, a historical venue, open to the
general public for recreation and for observation of historically significant gravesites (an
“educational use”); (2) regardless of Ms. DeVaughn’s subjective reason for visiting the
Cemetery the day she was injured, “[h]er conduct—walking through a publicly accessible,
historically promoted cemetery—falls within the scope of recreational use contemplated
by the statute”; and (3) it did not charge her a fee to enter the Cemetery on the day of her
injury. It asserts also that Ms. DeVaughn was not a business invitee when she visited the
Cemetery on April 18, 2024.
Neither party is entirely correct. Ms. DeVaughn devotes much of her brief to arguing
that she entered the Cemetery on the day of her injury as StoneMor’s business invitee and
that because of her status, the Recreational Use Statute doesn’t apply to her claim. But as
this Court has explained, the statute “covers all ‘non-paying’ recreational and educational
users, without regard to how they might otherwise be ‘categorized’ under common law.”
10
Fagerhus, 143 Md. App. at 540 (emphasis added). In other words, Ms. DeVaughn’s status
under the common law premises liability rules is irrelevant to whether the Recreational Use
Statute applies to her negligence claim against StoneMor.
StoneMor gets closer to the right legal inquiry but misses as well. As StoneMor
recognizes correctly, whether it holds the Cemetery open to the general public; for what
uses it holds the Cemetery open to the public; what Ms. DeVaughn was doing on the
property when she was injured (but not her subjective reason for being there); and whether
it charged her to enter the Cemetery on the day of her injury are all factors relevant to the
court’s determination of whether the Recreational Use Statute relieves StoneMor of any
liability for Ms. DeVaughn’s injury. Ms. DeVaughn doesn’t contest StoneMor’s assertion
that it makes the Cemetery available to the general public for recreation and for
“educational uses” like visiting and observing historically significant gravesites. See NR
§ 5-1101(c)(6). Nor does she allege that StoneMor charged her to enter the Cemetery on
the day she was injured. Further, and although Ms. DeVaughn argues that her use of the
Cemetery on that day—visiting and attending her son’s gravesite—was not recreational or
educational, StoneMor is right that, subjective purpose aside, her act of “walking through
a publicly accessible . . . cemetery” could fall plausibly “within the scope of recreational
use contemplated by the [Recreational Use Statute].” See NR § 5-1101(g).
That all said, Ms. DeVaughn asserts as well that StoneMor “operates the Cemetery
as a commercial enterprise”—selling burial plots to those looking for a place to visit and
remember their loved ones. StoneMor doesn’t dispute that assertion but would have us
affirm the circuit court on the theory that because it makes the Cemetery available generally
11
to the public for recreational and educational uses, the Recreational Use Statute would
relieve it of liability for any injury sustained anywhere on the Cemetery grounds by any
person engaged in any activity that could be characterized as recreational or educational.
That sort of holding would stretch the Recreational Use Statute beyond the statute’s stated
purpose and allow a landowner who uses their land for commercial purposes to avoid any
liability for injuries sustained on that land by opening it up to the public for recreational
use also. Instead, the proper analytical pathway is the one the Supreme Court laid out in
Wallace II, which instructs a court to look at the area where a plaintiff was injured; to
determine whether the landowner intended that area to be used for recreation and education
or for some other purpose; and, if it finds that the landowner did intend the area where the
injury occurred to be used for some other purpose, to determine whether the plaintiff’s use
was consistent with that purpose even if it could “also constitute[] a recreational activity.”
492 Md. at 370–71.
When the circuit court denied Ms. DeVaughn’s motion to reconsider its grant of
StoneMor’s motion to dismiss, it relied primarily on a finding that she entered the Cemetery
without charge on the day she was injured. But that is only one piece of the inquiry that
drives the potential application of the Recreational Use Statute to Ms. DeVaughn’s claim.
Under the standard established by this Court in Wallace I and the Supreme Court in
Wallace II, the court needs to determine as well if the area where Ms. DeVaughn fell was
one StoneMor intended to be used primarily for commercial purposes (i.e., the sale of burial
plots and related activities, like funerals or the visitation of loved ones’ gravesites) or if she
sustained her injury in an area intended for recreation (e.g., a walking or biking path) or
12
educational uses (e.g., an area of the Cemetery devoted to the observation of historically
significant gravesites). See 260 Md. App. at 410; 492 Md. at 370–71. If the court had found
first that Ms. DeVaughn was injured in an area intended for recreational or educational
uses and second that she was using the land for such purposes when she was injured, it
would have been proper for the court to deny her motion to reconsider on the grounds that
the Recreational Use Statute barred her claim against StoneMor. But if the court had found
first that Ms. DeVaughn was injured in an area of the Cemetery intended for commercial
purposes and second that her use of the property when she was injured was consistent with
those purposes even if it could be characterized as recreational as well, the court should
have allowed her claim to proceed. See Wallace II, 492 Md. at 370–71.
We recognize that the allegations in Ms. DeVaughn’s complaint don’t shed much
light on where in the Cemetery she was injured beyond the statement that she was “walking
around her child’s gravesite,” and the factual statements in StoneMor’s motion to dismiss
don’t resolve this point either. As a result, we reverse the judgment of the circuit court and
remand for the circuit court to apply—based on the allegations in the complaint or any
additional allegations Ms. DeVaughn might raise were she to amend the complaint—the
Wallace II standard for determining if the Recreational Use Statute applies to her claim.
JUDGMENT OF THE CIRCUIT COURT
FOR PRINCE GEORGE’S COUNTY
REVERSED AND REMANDED FOR
FURTHER PROCEEDINGS CONSISTENT
WITH THIS OPINION. APPELLEE TO
PAY COSTS.
13