Opinion ID: 2104401
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Court of Appeals Legal Determination

Text: The Court of Appeals erred in its determination that there was a special relationship between the police officers and Black which created a duty to protect her from harm. The circuit court correctly determined that there was no evidence of custody or other restraint at the time of the accident which was perpetrated by a state actor. Black was unable to establish the elements of a special relationship pursuant to Fryman , and thus her claims that the officers breached a duty to protect her fails as a matter of law. It is a question of law whether Black was in custody so as to establish a special relationship. The record indicates that the police officers did not exercise sufficient control over Black to establish that she was in custody. The fact that she was a passenger in a motor vehicle stopped in a police investigation did not establish custody. The evidence indicates that the officers did not make any threat of arrest to Black or in any way attempt to coerce her decision as to how she would leave the scene of the traffic investigation. Black repeatedly requested that she be allowed to leave the scene with Kritis, her boyfriend. She walked unassisted to the Kritis truck and thanked an officer for his courtesy in holding the door for her. The officers did not make any representations concerning whether or not she should leave with Kritis, nor did they indicate that they would protect or assist her in her decision in any way. The officers did not voluntarily assume any duty to protect Black. We agree with the officers that imposing a duty in this case in the absence of a special relationship as required by Fryman would be tantamount to establishing a universal duty of care on the police to prevent any third party harm to each and every citizen with whom they have contact regardless of how slight the interaction or brief the duration. As argued by the officers, the result would be exactly what the Court of Appeals suggested which would be to avoid potential liability, officers will simply drive past situations they encounter instead of stopping or investigating. Such a result is not in the public interest and is not required by the law. We are persuaded by the analysis provided by Ezell v. Cockrell, 902 S.W.2d 394 (Tenn.1995), which indicates that persons who serve the public must be allowed to carry out their function without fear of having to answer for harm caused to an individual by events which are outside the control of the public official. Public officials are not an insurer of the safety of every member of the public, nor are they personally accountable in monetary damages only because the individual is a public official charged with a general duty of protecting the public. The imposition of a universal duty of care severely reduces the ability of those public officials to engage in any discretionary decision-making on the spot. There is a danger of substituting the legal concept of foreseeability for custody as the threshold in establishing a special relationship. Cf. Holson v. State, 99 Md.App. 411, 637 A.2d 871 (1994). In that case it was held that an officer did not owe a duty to protect an inebriated passenger following the arrest of the driver of a vehicle for alcohol related driving. The inebriated passenger was left at the scene of the traffic stop and apparently walked into the path of a vehicle and was struck. The Court held that being intoxicated ... does not create a special relationship. The Kentucky Court of Appeals incorrectly analyzed the situation when it stated that a degree of discretion became ministerial once Black was in custody. Our examination of the record indicates that the circuit judge was correct in determining that Black was never in custody. The observation by the Court of Appeals that had the officers simply driven past the scene and refused to stop, there would not have been a restraint on Black's freedom is difficult to reconcile with any concept of public reliance on police and other public officials to assist or at least investigate during a time of difficulty. The reliance by the Court of Appeals on foreseeability only to create a duty essentially deprives all public officials, including police, of the ability to make an honest mistake of judgment. We must reject the attempt by the Kentucky Court of Appeals to establish a universal duty of care for all public officials. The better standard is the one enunciated in Fryman that before addressing foreseeability a court must first determine that there is a duty owed by public officials. Foreseeability does not create a duty. Rather, duty can only be created by showing the existence of a special relationship between the individual and the public official. As noted earlier, Fryman and Ashby, supra , require that the victim be in custody and that the violence or other offensive conduct be perpetrated by a state actor. Foreseeability of harm arises only after the establishment of the existence of a duty.