Going From Good Samaritan To Not So Good Samaritan In California

MayorBob.

Posted to Legal on Tue Mar 27, 2007 at 10:59:12 AM EST (promoted by port1080). RSS.

If you've just witnessed an auto accident bad enough that air bags have deployed and there are still people inside the vehicle unable to get out, what do you do?  At the very least, most people would try to call 911 to get some emergency medical personnel on the scene.  But then, there are those who go the extra step and try to render some sort of assistance themselves.  These "Good Samaritans" proceed with the knowledge that, as long as they aren't looking to be compensated for their actions, they will be sheltered from liability by the law.  As a matter of fact the laws that are supposed to protect them are called Good Samaritan laws.  But, are there limits to how much protection Good Samaritans can expect?  Yes, in the mind of three judges in the Third Division of the California Court of Appeals, ruled that Good Samaritans better know they are actually providing emergency medical care or they become Not So Good Samaritans.  

The case stemmed from a single car accident which occurred in November of 2004 when Anthony Watson lost control of his car and ran into a lightpost at about 45 miles per hour.  Watson and a passenger in the back seat managed to get out of the vehicle under their own power.  Alexandra Van Horn, in the front passenger seat, wasn't so lucky.  Lisa Torti, a friend of Van Horn's, was riding in a car right behind Watson's and she helped get Van Horn out of the car.  According to Torti, she carefully lifted Van Horn out of the car.  This is where the story breaks down because, according to Van Horn, Torti dragged her out of the car "like a rag doll."  One of the outcomes of the accident is that Van Horn is a paraplegic.  Because she believed her injuries were caused by Torti's rough removal of her from the car, she sued Torti for damages.

Torti's defense of being covered by the California statute seemed good enough for the trial judge who dismissed the suit.  Especially compelling was Torti's contention she removed Van Horn because she feared the car was going to explode; she had witnessed smoke coming out of the car and there was liquid leaking from it.  But when the appeals court heard the case, they came to a different conclusion (14 pg pdf doc).  The court found the statute had to be evaluated alongside a couple of other laws on the book, all of them parsing the words "emergency" and "medical."  Justice H. Walter Croskey observed that, because there appeared to be conflicts between what Torti claimed was the condition of the car, Van Horn's extraction didn't qualify as emergency medical treatment.  Thus, the case had to be retried by the lower court taking into account whether Torti's actions constituted negligence.  A doctor's examination revealed that Van Horn had likely suffered vertebral injuries when the air bags in the car deployed.

Robert Hutchinson, Van Horn's lawyer, said the decision doesn't automatically mean that Torti will lose her case.  Hutchinson said the law doesn't compel people to render aid; they just have to act reasonably and she will now have an opportunity to tell a "jury that what she did under the circumstances was reasonable."  That's unreasonable according to Torti's lawyer, Jody Steinberg, who believes the law should cover all Good Samaritans.  Steinberg said this decision, which "sends the wrong message" will end up in the state Supreme Court.