Court Opinion

ID: 9593578
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:23:21.337483+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:02:31.435848
License: Public Domain

MOSK, J., Concurring and Dissenting.
 Because I agreed with the substance of the majority opinion in Li v. Yellow Cab Co. (1975) 13 Cal.3d 804 [119 Cal.Rptr. 858, 532 P.2d 1226, 78 A.L.R.3d 393] (see id. at p. 830), I concur generally with Justice George’s analysis as set forth in part II of the lead opinion. And like the lead opinion, I conclude that the liability of sports participants should be limited to those cases in which their misconduct falls outside the range of the ordinary activity involved in the sport. As part I of the lead opinion explains, the kind of overexuberant conduct that is alleged here was not of that nature. I therefore agree that defendant was entitled to summary judgment, for the reasons set forth in part III of the lead opinion.
But I would go farther than does the lead opinion. Though the opinion’s interpretation of Li v. Yellow Cab Co. (supra, 13 Cal.3d 804) is reasonable, I believe the time has come to eliminate implied assumption of risk entirely. The all-or-nothing aspect of assumption of risk is as anachronistic as the all-or-nothing aspect of contributory negligence. As commentators have pointed out, the elements of assumption of risk “are accounted for already in the negligence prima facie case and existing comparative fault defense.” (Wildman & Barker, Time to Abolish Implied Assumption of a Reasonable Risk in California (1991) 25 U.S.F. L.Rev. 647, 679.) Plaintiffs’ behavior can be analyzed under comparative fault principles; no separate defense is needed. (See ibid.) Wildman and Barker explain cogently that numerous California cases invoke both a duty analysis—which I prefer—and an unnecessary implied assumption of risk analysis in deciding a defendant’s liability. (See id. at p. 657 & fn. 58.) In the case before us, too, the invocation of assumption of risk is superfluous: far better to limit the *322analysis to concluding that a participant owes no duty to avoid conduct of the type ordinarily involved in the sport.
Were we to eliminate the doctrine of assumption of risk, we would put an end to the doctrinal confusion that now surrounds apportionment of fault in such cases. Assumption of risk now stands for so many different legal concepts that its utility has diminished. A great deal of the confusion surrounding the concept “stems from the fact that the term ‘assumption of risk’ has several different meanings and is often applied without recognizing these different meanings.” (Rini v. Oaklawn Jockey Club (8th Cir. 1988) 861 F.2d 502, 504-505.) Courts vainly attempt to analyze conduct in such esoteric terms as primary assumption of risk, secondary assumption of risk, reasonable implied assumption of risk, unreasonable implied assumption of risk, etc. Since courts have difficulty in assessing facts under the rubric of such abstruse distinctions, it is unlikely that juries can comprehend such distinctions.
Justice Frankfurter explained in a slightly different context, “The phrase ‘assumption of risk’ is an excellent illustration of the extent to which uncritical use of words bedevils the law. A phrase begins life as a literary expression; its felicity leads to its lazy repetition; and repetition soon establishes it as a legal formula, undiscriminatingly used to express different and sometimes contradictory ideas.” (Tiller v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co. (1943) 318 U.S. 54, 68 [87 L.Ed. 610, 618, 63 S.Ct. 444, 143 A.L.R. 967] (cone. opn. of Frankfurter, J.).) Thus the Rini court, in attempting to determine the viability of assumption of risk in light of the Arkansas comparative fault law, was forced to identify “four types of assumption of risk . . . .” (Rini v. Oaklawn Jockey Club, supra, 861 F.2d at p. 505.) These included “implied secondary reasonable assumption of risk” and “implied secondary unreasonable assumption of risk.” (Id. at p. 506.)
I would eliminate the confusion that continued reliance on implied assumption of risk appears to cause, and would simply apply comparative fault principles to determine liability.