Court Opinion

ID: 9688047
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 16:58:24.426654+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:34.626801
License: Public Domain

Boyle, J.
(concurring). I concur in the lead opinion to the extent it holds that the waiver of sovereign immunity under MCL 691.1407; MSA 3.996(107) does not create a duty where none existed before and that “[a]pplied to police officers, the public-duty doctrine insulates officers from tort liability for the negligent failure to provide police protection unless an individual plaintiff satisfies the special-relationship exception.” Ante at 316. I also agree with the adoption by *326the lead opinion of the test in Cuffy v City of New York1 for cases of nonfeasance. The special-relationship exception is in essence a variation of the special-relationship standard of traditional negligence law that recognizes that where a “defendant has gone so far in what he has actually done, and has got himself into such a relation with the plaintiff, that he has begun to affect the interests of the plaintiff adversely,” Prosser & Keeton, Torts (5th ed), § 56, p 375, the line between active and passive conduct has been crossed and social policy justifies recognition of a duty.
I disagree with broader language in the lead opinion suggesting that the public-duty doctrine applies when an officer’s affirmative misconduct causes harm. This inquiry is different from the question whether, under the common law, the officer was liable for misfeasance and whether MCL 691.1407; MSA 3.996(107) definitively sets forth the parameters for such a cause of action against police officers, post at 353-355 (Levin, J.). The facts of this case do not require us to resolve whether the public-duty doctrine should be applied to insulate government agents who have assumed a duty and whose affirmative misconduct causes harm.
This case is before us on a motion for summary disposition brought pursuant to MCR 2.116(C)(8). Under the rule, summary disposition is granted if the claim is so clearly unenforceable as a matter of law that no factual development could possibly justify recovery. Plaintiff’s claim is tested by the pleadings alone, and all factual allegations contained in the *327complaint must be accepted as true. Simko v Blake, 448 Mich 648, 654; 532 NW2d 842 (1995). In this case, plaintiffs factual allegations in the complaint are, in pertinent part:
Defendant] ] Detroit Police Officers[2] . . . arrived upon the scene and were met by . . . decedent’s neighbors who explained that [decedent] was in apartment #203, that she had been screaming for help and that they witnessed her being attacked through her bathroom window.
. . . That Defendant Police Officers, after taking down the witnesses’ names, simply circled the building and left without ever attempting to knock on . . . decedent’s apartment door, or make any attempt to contact . . . decedent or determine if, in fact, she was being or had been attacked.
* * *
That . . . decedent died . . . three hours and twenty minutes after Defendant! ] Detroit Police Officers had arrived on the scene and failed to take action.
Plaintiff alleged in the complaint that this inaction by defendant police officers was grossly negligent, stating:
In Defendants [sic], Detroit Police Officers, failing to attempt to ascertain . . . decedent’s condition, or to render assistance in any way whatsoever when at the scene, and having been informed that . . . decedent had been under attack in her apartment shortly before their arrival;
* * *
In Defendant officers [sic] negligently failing to take any actions whatsoever to render assistance to . . . decedent after being apprised that there was a woman, in an identi*328fied apartment, screaming for help because her husband was about to kill her.
Clearly, plaintiff is not alleging that defendant Beasley’s affirmative actions caused the harm. Rather, plaintiff asserts that his inaction — his failure to render assistance — led to the harm. This is a crucial difference. As we stated in Williams v Cunningham Drug Stores, Inc, 429 Mich 495, 498-499; 418 NW2d 381 (1988):
In determining standards of conduct in the area of negligence, the courts have made a distinction between misfeasance, or active misconduct causing personal injury, and nonfeasance, which is passive inaction or the failure to actively protect others from harm. The common law has been slow in recognizing liability for nonfeasance because the courts are reluctant to force persons to help one another and because such conduct does not create a new risk of harm to a potential plaintiff. Thus, as a general rule, there is no duty that obligates one person to aid or protect another.
Thus, the Court in Williams concluded that for a person to be liable for nonfeasance, there must be a “special relationship” that imposes a duty to protect the other. 429 Mich 499. Although the issue in Williams involved a private citizen’s failure to prevent a criminal assault, the Court’s observation applies here. Neither police officers nor private citizens have a duty to rescue at common law. Prosser & Keeton, supra, § 56, pp 373 ff. Where liability has been imposed for nonfeasance, it has been on the basis of recognizing an affirmative duty to act based on a special relationship between the plaintiff and the defendant. Id. at 373. An allegation that an officer failed to rescue someone in danger is a charge that an officer *329has not fulfilled a sworn duty as an officer. MCL 752.11; MSA 28.746(101). However, as Justice Cavanagh correctly observes, executive decisions regarding use of resources in protection of the general public is of such overarching public importance that declining to impose an affirmative duty under this aspect of the public-duty doctrine continues to serve a vital social purpose. Whether to apply the public-duty doctrine where active misconduct causes a person’s injury, however, is a more difficult question.
Review of the special-relationship test found in Cuffy v City of New York and adopted by this Court today, suggests that it is meant to apply only in cases of nonfeasance. Cuffy explains that its special-relationship test is an exception to the general rule that “a municipality may not be held liable for injuries resulting from a simple failure to provide police protection . . . .” Id. at 260 (emphasis added). The test allows liability to be imposed on a municipality in the narrow circumstance where there is direct contact between a citizen and an officer, an officer assumes an affirmative duty to act, knows that inaction could lead to harm, and the citizen justifiably relies on the officer’s affirmative undertaking. The test, by its own terms, can only be applied in an instance where the officer failed to carry out a promise or an assumed duty to act.
This case, of course, does not involve active misfeasance. At most, defendant Beasley’s passive inaction could be said to be inconsistent with his duty to prevent crime or to provide police protection. While the result in this case is harsh, a contrary result could lead to officers arresting (and detaining) all persons *330who might conceivably jeopardize a foreseeable plaintiff. Because the specific holding of the lead opinion strikes the appropriate public policy balance, I agree that the public-duty doctrine applies. I also agree that plaintiffs complaint fails to satisfy the Cuffy special-relationship test. While the line between nonfeasance and misfeasance is admittedly imprecise, I would explicitly hold that we do not decide the question of the applicability of the public-duty doctrine to affirmative misconduct.

 69 NY2d 255; 505 NE2d 937 (1987).

 Two police officers were named as defendants in the complaint; the only police officer before this Court, however, is defendant Beasley.