Running head: TYPES OF LEGAL ACTIONS AND FORMS OF LEGAL DEFENSE 1

Artifact 5

Monica Chavez

Education 210: Nevada Law

Ms. Sherington

May 6, 2016
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Abstract

This paper discusses a legal case where a middle school boy is shot during

suspension that his parents were unaware of. His parents are suing the school for

liability charges. There are two cases stating why the parents should sue the school and

one case going against the liability, as well as two types of negligence as to why the

school should not be sued. To conclude the argument I will give my insight on the case

based on negligence and duty of the school.

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Schools are to inform the parents or guardians of any incidents regarding their child.

Incidents such as going to the nurse, fighting, tardies, abscenses, suspension and

expulsions are to be notified. At a middle school, a young boy named Ray Knight got

suspended because of three unexcused absences. The school informs parents by

calling them and sending a written notice of the suspension of their child. Instead of

confirming the suspension to the parents as they should have addressed, the school

sent a notice home with Knight. He threw the note away, so his parents never knew of

the suspension. On the first day of Knights suspension, he was unfortunately shot.

Currently Knights parents are trying to pursue liability charges against school officials.

To justify the liability charges a judge must look into: tort liability, negligence,

contributory negligence, and comparative negligence. There must also be examples of

liability such as the cases: Warrington v Tempe Elementary School District, Goss v

Lopez, and Pistolese v William Floyd School District.

A tort is described as a civil wrong, independent of breach of contract, for which

relief takes the forms of damages individuals are liable for the consequences of their

conduct that result in injury to others. (McCarthy 20) Part of a tort, is negligence which

is defined as a breach of ones legal duty to protect others from unreasonable risks

of harm. (McCarthy 20) In the case Warrington v Tempe Elementary School District, the

District lost the case due to negligence. Andrew, a seven year old boy rode the bus

home. The location of the bus stop was near the Intersection of the 41 street and

Southern Avenue. (Supreme Court of the State of New York Appellate Divison: Second

Judicial Department n.d.) After Andrew had been earlier threatened by Michael

claiming he would beat him up (Supreme Court of the State of New York Appellate
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Divison: Second Judicial Department Andrew n.d.) Andrew ran off... across a

frontage road onto Southern Avenue He was struck by a car and suffered severe and

permanent brain and spinal injuries. (Supreme Court of the State of New York

Appellate Divison: Second Judicial Department n.d.) Andrews parents sued the District

because of the location of the bus stop. His parents "subjected the location as a

foreseeable and unreasonable risk of harm as children walk home. (Supreme Court of

the State of New York Appellate Divison: Second Judicial Department n.d.) Since the

location was negligent because the legal duty to protect others from unreasonable

risks of harm. (McCarthy 20) the parents won. The District was sued based on

negligence and the duty of adequate supervision (McCarthy 21) Similar to

Andrew, Knights case too falls under negligence due to the lack of duty of the school.

Both adolescents were injured when negligence was supposed to protect them from any

injury.

The next case to support Knights liability is Goss v Lopez. This case involved

students being suspended for ten days because of possessing a substance that

resembled an illegal drug (McCarthy 177) Students reacted to their suspension by

stating the school was going against their due process. Part of the 14 th Amendment

includes the due process which ... ensures fundamental fairness if the government

threatens an individuals life, liberty, or property interest. (McCarthy 8) By the end of the

case, the Court ruled that such a right cannot be impaired unless the student is

afforded notice of the charges and the opportunity to refuse them before an impartial

decision maker. (McCarthy 176) As this case concluded, Knights suspension should
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have given him the notice and opportunity of the suspension, but did not do either. Goss

v Lopez and Knights cases were both against their due process.

Opposed to these cases, one case that goes against liability is the Pistolese v

William Floyd Union Free School District. During this case the plaintiff was assaulted

by other youths as he walked home from school with friends rather than ride a school

bus. (FindLaw's Court of Appeals of Arizona case and opinions. n.d.)This incident

occurred 30 minutes after plaintiff left the school grounds (FindLaw's Court of

Appeals of Arizona case and opinions. n.d.) Schools are responsible for a child when it

comes to transportation, coming or going to school until they get home. However, the

schools custodial duty ceases once the student has passed orbit of authority

and parents can resume control over childs protection. (FindLaw's Court of Appeals of

Arizona case and opinions. n.d.) The custodial duty plays the main role in this case

because the injured plaintiff was no longer in the defendants custody thus,

outside of the orbit of authority (FindLaw's Court of Appeals of Arizona case and

opinions. n.d.) Due to this, the school won because the plaintiffs failed to raise a

triable issue of fact that discovery might yield evidence warranting a different result.

(FindLaw's Court of Appeals of Arizona case and opinions. n.d.)

Following this case is two types of negligence that counters to tort liability. First is

Contributory Negligence that is plaintiffs are denied recovery if their actions are

shown to have been substantially responsible for injury. (McCarthy 30) These actions

must be reasonable for persons of similar age, maturity, intelligence and

experience. (McCarthy 30) Typical courts rule that children below the age of seven

are considered incapable of negligence, children ages seven and fourteen can be
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rebutted with incapability of negligence. (McCarthy 30) Contributory Negligence follows

with adult injury when on school grounds or campus too. The nature of the risk involved

and whether such a risk was known to the injured party or reasonably should have been

known. (McCarthy 31)An example of Contributory negligence is a father fell from

backless bleachers while watching his son participate in a basketball game. (McCarthy

31) The Court from Indiana won because the man failed to exercise the degree of

care that an ordinary, reasonable, and prudent person in a similar situation would

exercise. (McCarthy 31) Next is Comparative Negligence where the plaintiff bear

responsibility in proportion to fault. (McCarthy 31) An example for comparative

negligence was in Arizona, a boy got hit with a car and the district paid 15 percent

because the school was aware of students at the bus stop (McCarthy 31) Although

the school knew, the child and parents were escorting the boy home when it occurred.

These types of negligence explain that children too can be at fault if the actions are

shown or can bear the responsibility as their fault. Knight did not give the note to his

parents, so that can be defined as contributory negligence.

With these case examples and laws throughout the paper, I believe that Knights

parents should have defensible grounds to pursue liability charges. The school has a

duty to call the parents to inform them about the suspension. Since the school did not

do this, they disobeyed negligence. Knight got injured because of the school which

results in blaming the school for the incident. This could have been prevented if the

school did as they said they would about notifying parents with a call and written notice.
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References

Cambron-McCabe, N. H., McCarthy, M. M., Thomas, S. B., & McCarthy, M. M. (2009).

Legal rights of teachers and students (3rd ed.). Boston: Pearson Education.

Supreme Court of the State of New York Appellate Divison: Second Judicial Department

[PDF]. (n.d.).

FindLaw's Court of Appeals of Arizona case and opinions. (n.d.). Retrieved May 05,

2016, from http://caselaw.findlaw.com/az-court-of-appeals/1415411.html

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