Opinion ID: 749872
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Foreseeable and Fairly Direct Harm

Text: 18 The first element of the Kneipp test requires that the harm ultimately caused was a foreseeable and a fairly direct result of the state's actions. Although the plaintiff asserted this conclusion in his complaint, this is not necessarily sufficient to overcome defendants motion to dismiss. As we have noted, we need not accept bald assertions or legal conclusions contained in the complaint. In re Burlington Coat Factory Securities Litigation, 114 F.3d 1410, 1429-30 (3d Cir.1997)(quoting Glassman v. Computervision Corp., 90 F.3d 617, 628 (1st Cir.1996)). We hold that defendants, as a matter of law, could not have foreseen that allowing construction workers to use an unlocked back entrance for access to the school building would result in the murderous act of a mentally unstable third party, and that the tragic harm which ultimately befell Diane Morse was too attenuated from defendants' actions to support liability. 19 First, the complaint did not allege that defendants were aware of Stovall's violent propensities. There are no allegations that Stovall had made threats against Diane Morse or any other persons at the Lower Merion High School, or even that she had a history of violent behavior. The only allegation in the complaint that addresses whether defendants should have foreseen the danger posed by Stovall that day was that, during the week preceding the murder, she had been seen loitering in the school and the school area. (Complaint p 31). Assuming that defendants were aware of this fact, as we must when reviewing the grant of a motion to dismiss, this is insufficient as a matter of law to put defendants on notice that Stovall would return in a few days with a .38 revolver and a homicidal intent. 20 Second, there is no allegation that defendants were aware of anyone posing a credible threat of violence to persons inside the school building. Although the complaint alleges that defendants were aware of previous security breaches by unnamed persons, it does not allege that Stovall, or any other mentally deranged person, had entered the school building previously. In addition, the complaint contains no allegation, and plaintiff cannot prove any set of facts, that would demonstrate that defendants were aware of the likelihood that a mentally deranged person would enter the school in search of a victim. 21 Third, Stovall's attack was not a fairly direct result of defendants' actions. We recognize that plaintiff has alleged that the harm which befell Ms. Morse was a direct result of defendants' acts. But we are not bound to accept a conclusory statement, and as a matter of law this cannot be true. Plaintiff's allegation that, as a result of defendants' decision to allow construction workers to have access to the school through an unlocked rear entrance, Stovall was able to enter the building and murder Diane Morse is insufficient to support liability. While we must accept the allegation that Stovall gained access to the building through the unlocked rear entrance, this does not mean the attack on Diane Morse occurred as a direct result of defendants allowing the construction crews to prop open the door. The causation, if any, is too attenuated. Plaintiff can prove no set of facts which will provide the direct causal connection between Stovall's deadly attack and any of defendants' allegedly improper acts. 22 The cases which have found liability under the state-created danger theory do not stretch the concepts of foreseeability and causation this far. Kneipp itself involved a visibly inebriated and incapacitated woman who was left alone on the road by police. Consequently we concluded that a reasonable jury could find that the harm likely to befall Samantha if separated from [her husband] while in a highly intoxicated state in cold weather was indeed foreseeable and could have led directly to her injuries. 95 F.3d at 1208. 23 Similarly, the decisions to hold the state actors liable under the state-created danger theory in Wood v. Ostrander, 879 F.2d 583 (9th Cir.1989), and Cornelius v. Town of Highland Lake, 880 F.2d 348 (11th Cir.1989), were premised on facts in which the harm visited on the plaintiffs was more foreseeable than the random attack perpetrated by Stovall here. The plaintiff in Wood was the female passenger of a drunk driver who was pulled over late one evening by police. The driver was arrested and the car impounded, leaving Ms. Wood stranded on the road in a notoriously high crime area. After beginning the five mile walk to her home, Ms. Wood accepted a ride from an unknown man who subsequently took her to a secluded area and raped her. Addressing the issue of foreseeable harm, the court noted that the inherent danger facing a woman left alone at night in an unsafe area is a matter of common sense. 879 F.2d at 590 (citations omitted). 24 In Cornelius, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit found that prison and town officials could be liable to the plaintiff, who was abducted and held hostage for several days by prison inmates assigned to a community work program in the town hall where she was employed. Reversing the lower court's grant of summary judgment, the court of appeals found that genuine issues of fact existed which related to the special danger created by the work squad's presence in the town hall. The court noted that the defendants in Cornelius knew of the dangerous propensities of the prison inmates assigned to the work program, as well as the lack of supervision over those inmates, and thus were aware of the danger present from the community work squad inmates. 880 F.2d at 358. The ultimate manifestation of that danger was therefore foreseeable. By contrast, there is no allegation in the complaint here that defendants knew that Stovall posed a threat to anyone at Lower Merion High School, let alone Diane Morse. 25 In this respect the case before us is more analogous to the facts in Gregory v. City of Rogers, 974 F.2d 1006 (8th Cir.1992), cert. denied, 507 U.S. 913, 113 S.Ct. 1265, 122 L.Ed.2d 661 (1993). In Gregory, three friends were returning home from an evening of drinking, with one of them, Stanley Turner, serving as designated driver. The police stopped their vehicle for running a red light, and in the process of making a routine warrant check, discovered an outstanding warrant for Turner's arrest. At his request, the police allowed Turner to drive to the station in order to clear up the matter. After arriving at the station, Turner parked and went inside, leaving behind his two intoxicated passengers, and leaving the keys in the ignition. After waiting for thirty minutes, the passengers drove off, and were involved in a single car accident which killed the driver and injured the other passenger. Plaintiffs--the surviving passenger and the wife, son and estate of the decedent--brought a claim against the police under the state-created danger theory. The district court granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment, and the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, sitting en banc, affirmed. The court concluded that even if the police were aware that both passengers were intoxicated, a reasonable trier of fact could not find that the police placed them in a dangerous situation by merely leaving them alone in the car. Id. at 1011 (contrasting the facts there with the facts in Wood ). Simply put, it was not unsafe for the intoxicated [passengers] to wait for Turner inside the car where it was parked until Turner inexplicably left the keys with them. Id. at 1012. The court ruled that because Turner's unforeseeable act was the catalyst for the injury which plaintiffs suffered, the police could not be held liable. Id. 26 The same can be said in the case before us. Here, it was not defendants' decision to allow the rear entrance to the school to remain open that precipitated or was the catalyst for the attack on Ms. Morse. Furthermore, we believe that the harm allegedly created by the defendants in Gregory was more foreseeable than the harm allegedly created here. Unlike the situation in Gregory, where the defendants were aware that intoxicated passengers were left behind in the car, the defendants here were unaware that any mentally deranged person, let alone Stovall, was waiting outside the building for an opportunity to cause harm. Based on a review of the complaint, we find that plaintiff can prove no set of facts which will entitle him to relief. Defendants could not have foreseen the danger to Diane Morse, nor, as a matter of law, can their actions be said to have directly caused the attack. Consequently, plaintiff has failed to plead adequately the foreseeable injury element of the Kneipp test.