Michigan Supreme Court Lansing, Michigan

Robert P. Young, Jr.,
Chief Justice

Michael F. Cavanag h Marilyn Kell y Stephen J. Markma n Diane M. Hathawa y Mary Beth Kell y Brian K. Zahra,

J ustices 

# Order

December 21, 2011

1/November 2011

141624 141629

TRENDA JONES, Successor Personal Representative and Co-Personal Representative, BOOKER T. JONES, Co-Personal Representative, and MARGARET A. JONES, Co-Personal Representative, of the Estate of JAMAR CORTEZ JONES, Plaintiffs-Appellees,

v SC: 141624 COA: 288710 Wayne CC: 03-327528-NH DETROIT MEDICAL CENTER and SINAI-GRACE HOSPITAL, Defendants-Appellants, and

DANNY F. WATSON, M.D., and WILLIAM M. LEUCHTER, P.C., Defendants-Appellees.

________________ _______________ __________/

TRENDA JONES, Successor Personal Representative and Co-Personal Representative, BOOKER T. JONES, Co-Personal Representative, and MARGARET A. JONES, Co-Personal Representative, of the Estate of JAMAR CORTEZ JONES, Plaintiffs-Appellees,

v SC: 141629 COA: 288710 Wayne CC: 03-327528-NH DETROIT MEDICAL CENTER and SINAI-GRACE HOSPITAL, Defendants-Appellees,2

and

DANNY F. WATSON, M.D., and WILLIAM M. LEUCHTER, P.C., Defendants-Appellants.

________________ _______________ __________/

On order of the Court, leav e to appeal having been gran ted, and the briefs and oral arguments of the parties havi ng been considered by the C ourt, we hereby REVERSE the May 20, 2010 judgment of the Court of A ppeals and we REMAND this case to the Wayne Circuit Court for further proceedin gs consistent with this order.

Proximate causation involves examining the foreseeability of consequences and

whether a defendant should be held legally responsible for such consequences given his negligent acts or omissions. See, e.g., Skinner v Square D Co , 445 Mich 153, 163 (1994). This Court has defined proximate cause as “a foreseeable, natural, and probable

cause.” Shinholster v Annapolis Hosp , 471 Mich 540, 546 (2004); accord Nielsen v

Stevens , 368 Mich 216, 220 (1962). Such causation is distinct from factual or “but for” causation, and issues of proximate causation thus call for an independent, searching inquiry, the focus of which is whether the result of cond uct that created a risk of harm and any intervening causes were foreseeable. Moning v Alfono , 400 Mich 425, 439 (1977). Probability of harm is thus a releva nt consideration to determine whether the

defendant’s conduct was foreseeable or if th e defendant should be held legally liable in light of the circumstances. Since there are ri sks that can be fores een but would not be avoided by a reasonable person, fo r liability to attach the harm must be of a kind that

defendant should have avoided or it must be shown that defendant’s actions presented an

unreasonable risk of harm.

The lower courts erred by granting partia l summary disposition to plaintiffs on the issue of proximate causation here. The lo wer courts presumed that because the development of Stevens-Johnson Syndrome is a known risk of prescribing tegretol, proximate causation is per se established. After presuming that plaintiff could prove negligence, the lower court “c ollapse[d]” factual and proxima te causation such that the two were “essentially indistinguishable,” Jones v Detroit Medical Ctr , 288 Mich App 466, 481 (2010), contrary to traditional sta ndards for determining proximate causation. For a plaintiff to prevail on proximate cause at the summary disposition stage, it must be

shown that reasonable minds cannot differ that injury was a forese eable, natural, and probable consequence of the defendant’s neglig ence. Here, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to defendants, there is a question of fact in this regard th at should be

submitted to the trier of fact rather than decided as a matter of law.

H ATHAWAY

, J., ( dissenting ).I, Corbin R. Davis, Clerk of the Mi chigan Supreme Cour t, certify that the foregoing is a true and complete copy of the order entered at the direction of the Court.

_______________________________________ __ Clerk December 21, 2011

t1214 3

I believe that leave to a ppeal was improvidently grante d because the result reached by the Court of Appeals in this case was correct.

C AVANAGH and M ARILYN K ELLY , JJ., join the statement of H ATHAWAY , J.