Court Opinion

ID: 9796059
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 03:47:08.378469+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:48:49.033354
License: Public Domain

ECKERSTROM, Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
¶ 48 In this case, we address whether state and county law enforcement agencies owed a duty to the mother of a deceased juvenile to make reasonable efforts to identify the boy’s remains, when those agencies undertook to participate in a high-speed chase that resulted in his death13 and when those agencies subsequently had sole responsibility for, and custody of, his body. Although the well-reasoned majority opinion is consistent with this court’s previous holding in Morton, I cannot agree with my colleagues that, under pertinent Arizona jurisprudence, the agencies owed no duty of care under the circumstances of this case.
¶ 49 Our supreme court repeatedly has observed that duties of care can arise from the conduct a person has undertaken. Gipson, 214 Ariz. 141, ¶ 18, 150 P.3d at 232; Stanley v. McCarver, 208 Ariz. 219, ¶ 7, 92 P.3d 849, 851 (2004) (special relationship creating duty “may find its basis in ... undertakings”). The court previously applied that very principle when assessing the scope of a law enforcement agency’s duty of care to others. See Austin v. City of Scottsdale, 140 Ariz. 579, 581-82 & n. 2, 684 P.2d 151, 153-54 & n. 2 (1984) (although police owed no duty to protect citizens from “all harms,” agency had “duty to [surviving family of crime victim to] act as would a reasonably careful and prudent police department” once they have “opted to provide police protection” by receiving emergency calls). And, subsequent Arizona jurisprudence has relied on that analytical framework to determine whether law enforcement agencies owed any duty of care to specific plaintiffs. See McDonald v. City of Prescott, 197 Ariz. 566, ¶¶ 13-17, 5 P.3d 900, 902-03 (App.2000) (citing Austin and holding that, although officers owed no duty “per se ” to perform road maintenance, once officers undertook to routinely remove dangerous conditions from road, they owed duty to drivers to do so in a “ ‘reasonably careful and prudent’ ” manner), quoting Austin, 140 Ariz. at 582, 684 P.2d at 154; Newman v. Maricopa County, 167 Ariz. 501, 503, 808 P.2d 1253, 1255 (App.1991) (citing Austin and interpreting it to anchor duty of law enforcement agencies to others in the affirmative activities of law enforcement).
¶ 50 In this case, the agencies undertook to pursue the boy, undertook exclusive responsibility for his body, and consistent with the responsibilities arising from those actions, *319undertook some effort to identify it. Accordingly, they owed “a duty to act as would a reasonably careful and prudent police department in the same circumstances” in so doing. Austin, 140 Ariz. at 582, 684 P.2d at 154.
¶ 51 The majority relies on this court’s decision in Morton in holding the named agencies nonetheless owed no duty to Vasquez to identify her son. In that case, in the context of a claim that the county medical examiner’s office and county sheriff negligently had failed to identify a body, we held that neither the sheriff nor the examiner owed a duty to a murder victim’s family “either to submit dental records to the Department of Public Safety or to solve a homicide within any specific time frame.” 177 Ariz. at 149, 151, 865 P.2d at 810, 812.
¶ 52 Notwithstanding the similarity between the claim presented in Morton and the claim here, I would decline to follow that case for several reasons. First, although in Morton we addressed whether a state law enforcement agency owed a duty of care to others, this court did not discuss or cite Austin, a controlling Arizona supreme court opinion setting forth the relevant standards for analyzing that very question. Second, the holding in Motion is anchored almost exclusively in the reasoning of a California appellate court in Shelton v. City of Westminster, 138 Cal.App.3d 610, 188 Cal.Rptr. 205 (1982). See Morton, 177 Ariz. at 150, 865 P.2d at 811. But Shelton does not focus on whether a law enforcement agency may acquire a duty of care by undertaking a specific responsibility. See 188 Cal.Rptr. at 211-13. And, the portion of Shelton quoted in Morton suggests that law enforcement cannot acquire a duty of care by that method under California law. Morton, 177 Ariz. at 150, 865 P.2d at 811 (“ ‘[T]he undertaking by police to make a [missing person] report and assure [that] appropriate action will be taken does not create a “special relationship” from which “duty” is born.’ ”), quoting Shelton, 188 Cal.Rptr. at 213.
¶ 53 Thus, to the extent Morton fails to discuss Austin or any other Arizona case following Austin, it does not answer the question raised here: By undertaking the responsibility of identifying Angel’s body, did the defendants owe a duty to Vasquez to conduct those actions in a reasonably prudent fashion? To the extent Morton’s reliance on Shelton suggests this court may have implicitly rejected the notion that an agency’s own conduct may give rise to a duty, any such holding would no longer accurately characterize Arizona law. As discussed above, more recent opinions of our supreme court and the bulk of our state appellate jurisprudence applying Austin have clarified not only the general proposition that defendants may acquire a duty of care to others by undertaking conduct, but also that law enforcement agencies in particular may acquire a duty of care by doing so. See Gipson, 214 Ariz. 141, ¶ 18, 150 P.3d at 232 (special relationships supporting duty can arise from conduct undertaken by defendant); Stanley, 208 Ariz. 219, ¶ 13, 92 P.3d at 851 (imposing duty of care on physician with no direct relationship to patient based on physician’s undertaking to review an x-ray and report its results); see also McDonald, 197 Ariz. 566, ¶¶ 13-17, 5 P.3d at 902-03 (law enforcement agency acquired duty to remove hazards on road because agency routinely undertook that responsibility); Newman, 167 Ariz. at 503, 808 P.2d at 1255 (law enforcement acquires duty to exercise reasonable care as to activities it undertakes).
¶ 54 Finally, in Morton, we found that the state’s primary motivation to identify the human remains did not support the imposition of a duty. Under the circumstances there, we reasoned that
The state’s interest in identifying human remains is primarily to foster public safety through the investigation of suspected homicides. The identification of remains, of course, incidentally benefits friends and relatives. Because this is not the primary purpose, however, no relationship is created which would give rise to a duty to the Mortons.
177 Ariz. at 151, 865 P.2d at 812. But here, unlike the circumstances that resulted in the identification of the body in Morton, the officers knew precisely how Angel had died — as a result of a rollover car crash that occurred as the officers pursued him. Therefore, the record here would not support a finding that *320the state’s primary motivation in identifying the boy was to solve a homicide case. And, even assuming that a defendant’s primary purpose for engaging in specific conduct remains a relevant consideration in determining whether such conduct creates a special relationship to claimants, there can be little doubt here that the boy’s mother would have been an obvious and primary beneficiary of the agencies’ efforts to identify his remains— and that, by undertaking the task of doing so, the agencies created a special relationship with her.
¶ 55 Although the majority agrees with the general proposition that defendants, including law enforcement, may acquire a duty of care to others by undertaking conduct, it fears the lack of “reasonable limits” on potential causes of action arising from application of that principle. But, both our legislature and our courts are capable of narrowing the range of actionable conduct in the interests of public policy. See Gipson, 214 Ariz. 141, ¶¶ 34-41, 150 P.3d 228 (Hurwitz, J., concurring) (analyzing whether public policy as articulated by legislature and courts justifies imposition of duty). And, a thread of longstanding and recent Arizona supreme court jurisprudence, supported by contemporary scholarly wisdom, has eschewed the practice of limiting an actor’s duty of care based exclusively on preexisting “categorical relationships” identified in the common law or restatement. See, e.g., id. ¶¶ 18-22 (majority opinion); Stanley, 208 Ariz. 219, ¶ 8, 92 P.3d at 851-52 (acknowledging trend in Arizona jurisprudence to erode “[t]he requirement of a formalized relationship between the parties” when assessing the duty of care owed by one party to another); Ontiveros v. Bo-rak, 136 Ariz. 500, 509, 667 P.2d 200, 209 (1983) (every person under duty to avoid creating situations that pose unreasonable risk of harm to others); 1 Dan B. Dobbs, The Law of Torts § 227, at 579 (2001) (“[N]o duty rules should be invoked only when all cases they cover fall substantially within the policy that frees the defendant of liability.”). Indeed, Justice Hurwitz’s even broader suggestion that the court should “view the duty of reasonable care as the norm, and depart from that norm only in those cases where public policy justifies an exception to the general rule,” Gipson, 214 Ariz. 141, ¶ 35, 150 P.3d at 234 (Hurwitz, J., concurring), has yet to be rejected by our supreme court. See id. n. 4 (majority acknowledging that, based on its holding in Ontiveros, “one could conclude that people generally ‘owe a duty to exercise reasonable care to avoid causing physical harm’ to others, subject to exceptions that eliminate or modify this duty for reasons of policy”), quoting Restatement (Third) of Torts: Liability for Physical Hawn § 7 (Proposed Final Draft No. 1, 2005).
¶ 56 For the foregoing reasons, I would hold that the defendants, through their respective agencies, DPS and the Cochise County Sheriffs Department, owed a duty of care to Vasquez once they undertook the task of identifying her son’s remains. Of course, were we to find a duty here, it would remain for the trier of fact to determine whether the agencies acted as would “a reasonably careful and prudent police department under the circumstances” in attempting to identify Angel’s remains and what damages Vasquez suffered, if any, from any alleged breach of that duty.
¶ 57 I join the majority’s opinion as to all other issues addressed.

. I do not thereby suggest that the officers of the respective agencies necessarily engaged in any improper or negligent conduct in deciding to chase Angel. Whether the officers breached a reasonable standard of care in so doing is a jury question on the wrongful death claim unrelated to the issue of whether the agencies owed Vasquez any separate duty to identify her son.