Opinion ID: 1527812
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Burden on the Defendant

Text: [U]nintended harms are ordinarily compensable if caused by conduct that involves undue risks  risks that, along with other costs, outweigh the usefulness of the conduct causing the harms. Prosser & Keeton on The Law of Torts § 85, at 608 (5th ed. 1984) (footnote omitted). The harm that may result from a school counselor's failure to intervene appropriately when a child threatens suicide is total and irreversible for the child, and severe for the child's family. It may be that the risk of any particular suicide is remote if statistically quantified in relation to all of the reports of suicidal talk that are received by school counselors. We do not know. But the consequence of the risk is so great that even a relatively remote possibility of a suicide may be enough to establish duty. We pointed out in Jacques v. First Nat'l Bank, 307 Md. 527, 537, 515 A.2d 756, 761 (1986), that [a]s the magnitude of the risk increases, the requirement of privity is relaxed  thus justifying the imposition of a duty in favor of a large class of persons where the risk is of death or personal injury. See Council of Co-Owners Atlantis Condominium, Inc. v. Whiting-Turner Contracting Co., 308 Md. 18, 35 & n. 5, 517 A.2d 336, 345 & n. 5 (1986) (recognizing a duty against architects, enforceable by recovery for economic loss, if building conditions present a clear risk of death or personal injury). Moreover, when the risk of death to a child is balanced against the burden sought to be imposed on the counselors, the scales tip overwhelmingly in favor of duty. Certainly the physical component of the burden on the counselors was slight. Eisel claims only that a telephone call, communicating information known to the counselors, would have discharged that duty here. We agree. The counselors argue that there are elements of confidentiality and discretion in their relationships with students that would be destroyed by the imposition of a duty to notify parents of all reports of suicidal statements. Confidentiality does not bar the duty, given that the school policy explicitly disavows confidentiality when suicide is the concern. The defendants further point out that counselors are required to exercise discretion when dealing with students. Their discretion, however, cannot be boundless when determining whether to treat a student as a potential suicide. Discretion is relevant to whether the standard of conduct has been breached under the circumstances of a given case. Discretion does not create an absolute immunity, which would be the effect of denying any duty.