Court Opinion

ID: 9789076
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 01:27:32.231524+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:19.341826
License: Public Domain

ESPINOSA, Chief Judge,
dissenting.
¶ 36 Respectfully, I cannot agree with the majority’s, in my view, overly technical analysis to reach a conclusion it candidly acknowledges is both counterintuitive and bad public policy. And, I would venture, contrary to common sense. To say that parents of school children may be surprised and alarmed to discover that their children could be subject to personal liability as a result of innocently carrying out a teacher’s routine directive is no small understatement. On the other hand, I believe it requires no legal calisthenics to determine that the student defendants in this case merely stepped into the shoes of their teacher, for purposes of this action, when they obediently carried out her command and did so, even under the limited record in this case, clearly and solely in furtherance of a school purpose. Whether this conclusion would necessarily require that students be covered under the Workers’ Compensation Act for other purposes is a distinctly different inquiry that would depend on different facts not before us.
¶ 37 The unfortunate impact of this ruling will be to send a bleak message to parents and guardians that their children and, for practical purposes, their insurance policies, are at risk should their children merely cooperate with teachers’ commonplace requests to lend various forms of assistance during school. How this new class of defendants will determine what types of cooperation may or may not expose them to liability, and the extent of the resulting chill and additional burden on student-teacher relationships, is highly troubling. Because the unremarkable accident and alleged injury in this ease are, as the majority recognizes, entirely foreseeable occupational hazards for teachers who daily work in a school environment, it does no damage to our workers’ compensation scheme to avail these unsuspecting children and their families of its protection and to restrict the plaintiff to her chosen remedy under law. It would also make sense.