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STEVENS v. DES MOINES SCHOOL DIST.2/22/1995
Danny Stevens was attending a middle school in Des Moines when he was beaten by another student, Shawn Harris. Danny and his parents (collectively "Stevens" or "the plaintiff") sued the Des Moines Public School District, alleging failure to reasonably warn potential victims of Shawn Harris's violent nature, failure to control Harris, and failure to properly supervise the students. The jury found that the school was negligent, but found that its negligence was not a proximate cause of the injuries. The plaintiff appealed. We reverse and remand.
The gist of the plaintiffs' action was that the school had been negligent in the protection of its students, specifically Danny. The record reveals the following facts supporting the jury's finding of negligence. Shawn Harris mistakenly believed that Stevens was the brother of an older boy who had struck Harris earlier on the day of the assault. Harris reported that Stevens had provoked him by calling him a "nigger." Harris chased Stevens down the hallway at the school and beat him. The school records contain an extensive record of aggressive acts by Harris.
The plaintiffs alleged that the school was negligent in failing to warn Stevens that Harris might be seeking revenge against Stevens and in failing to provide adequate hall monitoring.
The district court submitted the case to the jury with an instruction that, if the plaintiff's injuries resulted from an unforeseen and sudden act of another pupil, this act would be a superseding cause of the injury and that the negligence of the school district could not be the proximate cause. It is this instruction that provides the primary issue on appeal.
I. The Superseding Cause Issue.
The district court gave Uniform Jury Instruction 700.3, the general instruction on proximate cause. Neither party objected to this instruction. But the court gave an additional instruction on proximate cause that did raise an objection. This was Instruction No. 24, which stated:
If you find that the injuries resulted from an unforeseen and sudden, impulsive or spontaneous act of another pupil, such act is the superseding cause of injury and [528 NW2d Page 119]
the conduct cannot be considered to be a proximate cause of the injury.
At trial, the plaintiff objected to this instruction on the ground that it was "not the law in Iowa" and was "not applicable to this case in which we have a special duty of hall monitors while they're in the halls."
We address the issue raised by Instruction No. 24, despite Stevens' failure to clearly state the grounds for the objection. We do so because (1) the objection at least alluded to the problem with Instruction No. 24 by raising the "special duties" of hall monitors (presumably to protect students from aggressive acts by others); and (2) most important, the school district concedes in its brief that the plaintiff preserved error on the issue.
The general rule on superseding cause is stated by the Restatement:
The act of a third person in committing an intentional tort or crime is a superseding cause of harm to another resulting therefrom, although the actor's negligent conduct created a situation which afforded an opportunity to the third person to commit such a tort or crime, unless the actor at the time of his negligent conduct realized or should have realized the likelihood that such a situation might be created, and that a third person might avail himself of the opportunity to commit such a tort or crime.
Restatement (Second) of Torts ยง 448 (1965). The Restatement section that follows, however, qualifies the general rule in some cases:
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