Court Opinion

ID: 9606180
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 02:48:01.305934+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:33.806078
License: Public Domain

PETERSON, J.,
concurring in part; dissenting in part.
This case has evoked more than a little interest from the members of this court and has resulted, because of the disqualification of one of our members, in a three to three amiable disagreement.
This dissenting opinion sets forth the reasons supporting the affirmance of the trial court’s ruling.

*572
There is no precedent allowing recovery under facts similar to those at bar

At the outset, I will concede that the law is not an inanimate, unmoving thing. Quite the contrary, the law must be capable of meeting the needs of a dynamic, changing society. And merely because no court has allowed recovery under the facts alleged is not necessarily dispositive. But the collective judgment of appellate judges from the other 49 states is worthy of some respect.
I have attempted to find and read every case involving claims against public bodies arising from the acts of escaped prisoners. Most jurisdictions deny recovery out of hand. No jurisdiction has allowed recovery under the facts alleged in the plaintiff’s complaint. Should we be the first to allow recovery? I think not.
A list of the cases involving claims against public bodies arising from the acts of escaped prisoners is in the margin.1 An analysis of these cases reveals:
1. In every case in which recovery was allowed, there was a custodial relationship between the escaping prisoner and the person or entity sought to be held liable.
2. In every case allowing recovery, a recognizable high risk of harm existed, invariably including a history of past conduct (often described as a "propensity for violence toward others”) which alerts the person having physical custody to the risk of physical harm to others in the event of an escape.
Not one of these factors exists here. There was no custodial relationship between Murphy and Thompson. Thompson had no record of violent conduct. No *573facts are alleged which would put Murphy on notice that Thompson would kill the plaintiff’s decedent.

Necessity for Custodial Relationship

The rule that a custodial relationship must exist is stated in Restatement of Torts (Second), § 315:
"There is no duty so to control the conduct of a third person as to prevent him from causing physical harm to another unless
"(a) a special relation exists between the actor and the third person which imposes a duty upon the actor to control the third person’s conduct, or
"(b) a special relation exists between the actor and the other which gives to the other a right to protection.”
The type of "special relation” contemplated by Section 315 is further defined in Section 319, which reads:
"One who takes charge of a third person whom he knows or should know to be likely to cause bodily harm to others if not controlled is under a duty to exercise reasonable care to control the third person to prevent him from doing such harm.”
It is the custodial relationship which gives rise to the duty. Absent this relationship, no duty exists to control the conduct of the criminal actor.

There must be a "recognizable high degree of risk of harm”

If there is one thing that the cases and Restatement make clear, it is that a mere "risk of harm” is not sufficient to create liability. There must be, prospectively, a "recognizable high degree risk of harm” from the future misconduct of the third person, before liability ensues.
In every case where recovery has been allowed (and in many cases where recovery was «oí allowed), there was evidence, from the previous record of the escaping criminal, that the criminal in custody was peculiarly likely to inflict harm upon others. For example, in Williams v. State, 308 NY 548, 127 NE2d 545, 550, *574(1955), the New York Court of Appeals, in rejecting recovery, noted that there was nothing in the criminal’s record to give "any indication that he was likely to wander from the prison and assault members of the public.” The Louisiana Court of Appeals, in allowing recovery in Frank v. Pitre, 341 So 2d 1376, 1379, 1380 (La App 1977), noted that the escaped person "was a known criminal with a propensity for violence toward others.”2
The Restatement also sets forth a restrictive rule.
Comment d to Section 302B states:
"Normally the actor has much less reason to anticipate intentional misconduct than he has to anticipate negligence. In the ordinary case he may reasonably proceed upon the assumption that others will not interfere in a manner intended to cause harm to anyone. This is true particularly where the intentional conduct is a crime, since under ordinary circumstances it may reasonably be assumed that no one will violate the criminal law. Even where there is a recognizable possibility of the intentional interference, the possibility may be so slight, or there may be so slight a risk of foreseeable harm to another as a result of the interference, that a reasonable man in the position of the actor would disregard it.”
The editors go on to say (Comment e), page 90, Section 302B Restatement (Second):
"There are, however, situations in which the actor, as a reasonable man, is required to anticipate and guard against the intentional, or even criminal misconduct of others. In general, these situations arise where the actor is under a special responsibility toward the one who suffers the harm, which includes the duty to protect him against such intentional misconduct; or where the actor’s own affirmative act has created or exposed the other to a recognizable high degree of risk of harm through such misconduct, which a reasonable man would take into account. * * *” (Emphasis added.)
*575As an example of a situtation where there is a "recognizable high degree of risk of harm,” the Restatement contains the following (F and H to 302B):
"F. Where the actor has taken charge or assumed control of a person whom he knows to be peculiarly likely to inflict intentional harm upon others.” (Emphasis added.)
"H. Where the actor acts with knowledge of peculiar conditions which create a high degree of risk of intentional misconduct. ” (Emphasis added.)
There is no doubt that Restatement of Torts (Second), § 449, states that liability can arise from the act of a third, person, even though it is "intentionally tortious, or criminal.” However, stringent limitations are placed upon this rule. See Comment a:
"* * * [T]he mere possibility or even likelihood that there may be such misconduct is not in all cases sufficient to characterize the actor’s conduct as negligence. It is only where the actor is under a duty to the other, because of some relation between them, to protect him against such misconduct, or where the actor has undertaken the obligation of doing so, or his conduct has created or increased the risk of harm through the misconduct, that he becomes negligent.”

Under Oregon Law No Cause of Action is Stated

Four recent Oregon cases discuss the test of foreseeability vis-a-vis (1) the determination of whether the defendant is negligent; (2) the determination of whether the defendant’s negligence is the proximate cause of the injury; and (3) the allocation of the determination between the court and jury. Those four cases are Dewey v. A. F. Klaveness & Co., 233 Or 515, 379 P2d 560 (1963); Mezyk v. National Repossessions, 241 Or 333, 405 P2d 840 (1965); Stewart v. Jefferson Plywood Co., 255 Or 603, 469 P2d 783 (1970); Allen v. Shiroma/Leathers, 266 Or 567, 514 P2d 545 (1973).
In Dewey v. A. F. Klaveness & Co., supra, Justice O’Connell wrote a lengthy concurring opinion in which he pointed out that the "test of foreseeability” is applicable "not only in determining whether defendant is *576negligent, but also in determining whether his negligence is the proximate cause of the injury.” 233 Or at 527.
Justice O’Connell opined (233 Or at 539):
"* * * [T]he law of causation under existing practice is so ill-defined and confused that it offers little or no aid either to the courts or to the juries in the solution of the problems of liability * * *. The principal source of confusion is the treatment of causation, both as a factual concept, i.e., as to whether defendant’s conduct is physically connected with the injury, and as a liability concept, i.e., as to whether, under the circumstances, the defendant should be held liable for the injury he caused. In present practice these two concepts are fused together in one expression 'proximate cause’ and as a consequence both concepts become confused. To avoid this confusion I have separated the issue of factual causation from all other questions involved in the case and avoided the use of the term 'causation’ in any other sense. The issue of factual cause involves only the question of whether defendant’s conduct was a substantial factor in producing the injury of which plaintiff complains. That is to be regarded as a pure question of fact. It calls for no judgment as to whether defendant is to be held liable for what he factually caused. * * *” (Emphasis in opinion; footnote omitted.)
Ultimately, Justice O’Connell’s doctrine, first articulated in Dewey v. A. F Klaveness & Co., supra, was adopted as the law of Oregon. See Stewart v. Jefferson Plywood Co., supra. In that case, the opinion was written by Justice O’Connell, who wrote (255 Or at 606):
"The scope of the liability of an actor whose conduct is a substantial factor in causing an injury is frequently discussed under the rubric 'proximate cause’ or 'legal cause,’ and less frequently as a part of the definition of negligence. We have adopted the latter approach. Whatever language is used to categorize the problem, the injury is essentially the same: (1) what factors are relevant in setting the *577limits of liability for conduct which is a cause, in a substantial sense, of an injury, and (2) what are the respective functions of the court and jury in passing upon the question of the defendant’s liability?” 255 Or at 606.
"The temptation here is to leave the question to the jury where the problem can be solved by an intuitive process, thus relieving us from the judicial task of reaching a reasoned conclusion. Unfortunately, however, we have inherited the duty to exercise control over the jury and to keep it within the bounds set for it, vague as they may be.” 255 Or at 607.
"This idea of limiting liability to that which can be anticipated is formulated into the foreseeability test for negligence, which states that one is negligent only if he, as an ordinary reasonable person, ought reasonably to foresee that he will expose another to an unreasonable risk of harm. Foreseeability is an element of fault; the community deems a person to be at fault only when the injury caused by him is one which could have been anticipated because there was a reasonable likelihood that it could happen.
"Thus fault, as the term is usually understood, is not associated with conduct which causes harm through the concatenation of highly unusual circumstances. If, in our appraisal of the community’s conception of fault, we find that the conduct in question clearly falls outside the conception, we are charged with the duty of withdrawing the issue from the jury.
"The specific question before us is, then, whether plaintiff’s injury and the manner of its occurrence was so highly unusual that we can say as a matter of law that a reasonable man, making an inventory of the possibilities of harm which his conduct might produce, would not have reasonably expected the injury to occur. Stated in another way, the question is whether the circumstances are out of the range within which a jury could determine that the injury was reasonably foreseeable.” 255 Or at 609.
Finally, we come to Allen v. Shiroma/Leathers, 266 Or 567, 514 P2d 545 (1973). The opinion was written *578by Justice Denecke, who began his discussion with this question (266 Or at 569):
"* * * By what criteria should the extent of defendant’s liability be determined, and does the judge or the jury make the determination?”
On page 571, Justice Denecke pointed out that the determination of the standard [one might also call it the "drawing of the line”] represents the general level of moral judgment of the community. He pointed out that "this basic concept of blameworthiness * * * [includes] an anticipation of general kinds of harm to persons in the general class threatened.” (Emphasis added.) However, in "drawing the line,” conduct is excluded "which causes harm through the concatenation of highly unusual circumstances.”
Justice Denecke concluded with a reference to Restatement of Torts (Second), § 435(2):
"The actor’s conduct may be held not to be a legal cause of harm to another where after the event and looking back from the harm to the actor’s negligent conduct, it appears to the court highly extraordinary that it should have brought about the harm.”
From these four cases, it is clear that it is not correct to simply say that "foreseeability is normally a jury question.” In every case, the court has a threshold obligation to determine whether the fault of the defendant is actionable. This obligation of the court involves the element of foreseeability (see Justice O’Connell’s comment in Stewart v. Jefferson Plywood Co., supra at 609) and involves our determination of the boundary of community standards that a person is responsible for an injury because it could have been anticipated because there was a reasonable likelihood that it could happen. In making this determination, fault-associated conduct excludes conduct "which causes harm through the concatenation of highly unusual circumstances.”
Obviously, the key question in the case at bar is whether the murder of the plaintiff’s decedent was *579(quoting from Stewart, supra, 255 Or at 609) "so highly unusual that we can say as a matter of law that a reasonable man, making an inventory of the possibilities of harm which his conduct might produce, would not have reasonably expected the injury to occur.”
It takes a real stretch of the imagination to say that the murder of Officer Christensen was reasonably to be expected by Murphy when she "permitted and assisted defendant Thompson in entering the center.”
I concur with the court’s opinion in its analysis of ORS 30.270.

 Frank v. Pitre, 353 So 2d 1293 (La 1977); State v. Silva, 86 Nev 911, 478 P2d 591 (1971); Geiger v. State, 242 So 2d 606 (La App 1970); Green v. State, 91 So 2d 153 (La App 1956); Webb v. State, 91 So 2d 156 (La App 1956); Williams v. State, 308 NY 548, 127 NE2d 545 (1955); State of West Virginia v. Fidelity & Casualty Co. of New York, 263 Fed Supp 88 (DC W Va 1967); Azcona v. Tibbs, 190 Cal App 2d 425, 12 Cal Rptr 232 (1961); Moss v. Bowers, 216 NC 546, 5 SE2d 826 (1939); Hullinger v. Worrell, 83 Ill 220 (1876); Annot., 44 ALR3d 899, Liability — Harm by Escaped Prisoner (1972).

 Frank v. Pitre, 341 So 2d 1376 (La App 1977), was reversed on other grounds, 353 So 2d 1293 (La 1977).