Court Opinion

ID: 9618929
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 05:19:36.359086+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:04:33.847945
License: Public Domain

Rosellini, J.
(concurring) — While I agree that the respondents should not be held liable to the appellants for injuries caused by persons who were not acting as agents of the respondents, I do not think that the reason is that the events did not occur “in a natural and continuous sequence.” I think it is that the respondents owed no duty to *120the appellants to protect them from this harm. The pursuit and flight were direct consequences of the theft, which was directly facilitated by the car being left unlocked. But it is not the policy of the law to hold an individual liable for injuries caused by a third person, to whom he has relinquished possession of his chattel, unless there is a special relationship existing between the defendant and the third person, such as agency, or unless the defendant knew or should have known that the third person was likely to cause harm to others.
In the California case of Richards v. Stanley, 43 Cal. 2d 60, 271 P.2d 23 (1954), Justice Traynor, speaking for the supreme court sitting en banc, said that in the absence of statute, it has generally been held that the owner of an automobile is under no duty to persons who may be injured by its use to keep it out of the hands of a third person in the absence of facts putting the owner on notice that the third person is incompetent to handle it. Justice Traynor pointed out that the owner of a vehicle who loans it to another is liable for injuries caused by him only if he knew or should have known that the person to whom he lent the vehicle was not a competent driver. This is provided by statute in California; in Washington it is the rule of law laid down by this court. Coins v. Washington Motor Coach Co., 34 Wn.2d 1, 208 P.2d 143 (1949).
If an owner is not liable for injuries caused by a driver to whom the owner has knowingly lent his vehicle, in the absence of some special relationship or knowledge of the driver’s incompetence, how much less should the law hold him liable for injuries caused by a thief? As Justice Tray-nor observed, the general rule is that there is no liability.
Does the statute, RCW 46.61.600, change this? It appears to me that the statute is designed for the protection of the owner and for the protection of others in the path of the vehicle if it should be put in motion by reason of having been insecurely parked. If it was intended to make the owner liable to a class of persons toward whom there was no common-law liability, the legislature' should have ex*121pressed this intent in unequivocal terms. As the statute stands, it was reasonably intended to prevent runaways and to prevent thefts. It does not reveal an intent to give to persons injured by the carelessness of thieves a right of recovery which they did not formerly have against the thief’s victim.
I would construe the statute narrowly, so as to avoid conflict with the common law and yet give effect to its terms according to their obvious, though limited intent.
For these reasons, I also would affirm.
Neill and Stafford, JJ., concur with Rosellini, J.
Petition for rehearing denied March 1, 1972.