New York Judge Rules 6-Year-Old Can Be Sued 799
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by
Soulskill
from the court-is-more-interesting-than-kindergarten-anyway dept.
from the court-is-more-interesting-than-kindergarten-anyway dept.
suraj.sun sends this snippet from Reuters:
"A girl can be sued over accusations she ran over an elderly woman with her training bicycle when she was 4 years old, a New York Supreme Court justice has ruled. The ruling by King's County Supreme Court Justice Paul Wooten stems from an incident in April 2009 when Juliet Breitman and Jacob Kohn, both aged four, struck an 87-year-old pedestrian, Claire Menagh, with their training bikes. Menagh underwent surgery for a fractured hip and died three months later. In a ruling made public late Thursday, the judge dismissed arguments by Breitman's lawyer that the case should be dismissed because of her young age. He ruled that she is old enough to be sued and the case can proceed."
Ruling != Legislating (Score:5, Informative)
The law (which he probably didn't write) says that accountability starts at four years old. The child was four.
What else was the judge supposed to do?
Please File Things Under Idle Where They Belong (Score:1, Informative)
Hey Soulskill, please file things under Idle where they belong. This is not News For Nerds nor is it Stuff That Matters, so it doesn't belong on the Slashdot frontpage.
Re:What happened to accidents? (Score:5, Informative)
It's very simple: there's one set of rules for the peasants and another set of rules for the aristocracy.
Guess which group you fall into?
Re:Ruling != Legislating (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Ruling != Legislating (Score:3, Informative)
This isn't a criminal investigation, though.
Suing is civil.
Re:Ruling != Legislating (Score:3, Informative)
Aren't you ignoring half of what he quoted?
and to provide minimum guarantees for the fairness and quick resolution of judicial or alternative proceedings.
Re:Ruling != Legislating (Score:5, Informative)
Previous rulings have held that there is a sliding scale of responsibility between 4 and, I believe, 12. At four a child is presumed to not be capable of fully understanding their actions so it is on the plaintiff to prove that this particular four year old did understand. A very tough task indeed. At 12, the burden is on the defense to prove that this particular child could not understand his/her actions.
The big decision in this case was that the parents cannot be sued. Now the plaintiff is going to have to prove that a four year old on her training wheeled bike, racing another child, was cognizant of the ramifications of her actions of riding on the sidewalk. Good luck with that.
Re:What is the point? (Score:3, Informative)
Maybe, just maybe, you should specify which country you live in, not which continent.
I live in Germany, and you can do fuck all to a 6 year old. A 6 year old could throw in your window and nobody, not the kid nor the parents would have to pay.
Some Important Clarifications (Score:5, Informative)
First, this was a trial court ruling by a judge, not a justice. This did not create or modify precedent for other courts. In New York, unlike the rest of the US, the low-level trial courts are called Supreme Courts [wikipedia.org]. What the rest of us would think of as "The Supreme Court" is called the Court of Appeals [wikipedia.org]. Yes, it's very confusing.
Second, this was a ruling on a motion to dismiss, not a ruling on the merits. This only says the child may be sued, not that the child is liable, nor even that the child (as opposed to the parents) would be made to pay anything. The parents are being sued as well; this is not some spiteful attack on the child in particular.
Third, this is not surprising in the least from a legal perspective and relies upon well-settled legal principles. In general the law in the US does not recognize an absolute age limit to liability. For negligence, children are judged according to the standard of a reasonable child of that age (unless they are undertaking an adult activity such as driving a car). For a four year old, that's not saying much.
Fourth, there's nothing uniquely American about this. Several European countries have similar or even harsher rules [udg.edu]. In France, for example, children are judged according to the same negligence standard as adults, which is much stricter than the US rule.
Re:What is the point? (Score:1, Informative)
In which European country can you sue a four year old child? In Germany, you can sue the parents for failing to supervise the child. If the judge finds that the parents did all they could be expected to do, then the blame game ends there. Parents are not automatically responsible for the mischief of their children. Children less than seven years of age are not responsible for their own actions. No ifs and buts. Other restrictions are listed in BGB 828.
Suppose this case had happened in Germany: If the judge finds that the parents supervised the kids as required by law or if supervision would not have made a difference, then the parents would not be held liable. Since the kid is under seven years old, it is not responsible either. End of story.
Re:What is the point? (Score:3, Informative)
Actually they probably would have spanked me even if it was accidental just to emphasize the point that I shouldn't have done that.
The 80s were such a cruel time to grow up.
Re:Some Important Clarifications (Score:5, Informative)
Yup, I checked the rules here in Norway. Age of criminal responsibility is 15, but for negligence:
1-1. (children's responsibility.)
Children and youth below 18 are liable for harm that they cause intentionally or negligently, as far as it seems reasonable taking their age, development, behavior, economic ability and other circumstances into consideration.
1-2. (parent's responsbility)
1. Parents are liable for harm caused by children and youth under 18, as far as they have not given proper care or in other ways not have done what is reasonable under the circumstances to avoid damage.
2. Regardless of own guilt parents are liable for harm caused intentionally or negligently by their children and youth under 18 that they live with and have care for, with up to 5000 NOK (850 USD) per incident.
There's no minimum age mentioned, now I think under no circumstances would anyone convict a four year old under 1-1, but if someone absolutely wanted to try it in court then there's no formal reason to dismiss it.
Re:What is the point? (Score:4, Informative)
"legal murder" is a mistatement of terms. Murder is premeditated illegal killing. Self-defense is usually not premeditated, and it's not illegal. I think the technical term for killing is homicide, and that doesn't assign guilt or assume planning. There are adjectives to describe the cause of the homicide.
Re:Supposed to do? (Score:5, Informative)
Is that really the world you want to live in? Where parents keep their children on a 12 inch leash and act as a force field protecting their children from the universe, and the universe from their children? Because that produces kids who are by definition unresponsible, and by training co-dependent.
By the way, the mom was supervising the child. A fact that nobody had disputed until you.
Re:Ruling != Legislating (Score:2, Informative)
First, the US has not ratified this convention and therefore does not have to abide by it. A case could be made that the convention merely codified customary international law but the judge in this case wasn't in a position to decide that.
Second, you left out the first sentence of Article 40 which states: "Children who are accused of breaking the law. . ." This is a civil case and not criminal. The child is not charged with breaking any law just with acting in a negligent manner which harmed a person. Art. 40 is a regulation on criminal trials and not civil.
Re:What is the point? (Score:4, Informative)
This is a pretty standard ruling under American Tort law. In civil negligence cases, the standard for negligent acts performed by children is whether a reasonable child of the defendant's age, intelligence, and experiences would have exercised reasonable care in this situation. (This is, of course, more generous a standard than is applied to adults, where the standard is whether a reasonable person would have exercised reasonable care. This is to say that, for the child, the test is more subjective and is geared specifically to the intelligence and experience of the child in question.)
As to the point of all of this, the deceased woman's estate can make a civil negligence claim against the child for medical expenses (which may be quite high - I haven't the first idea as I'm not a doctor), lost income/life expectancy (which in this case will be very low), and funeral costs. The one thorny legal issue that will likely come up in this case is whether the death was proximately caused by the bike crash. If there were some intervening cause of the death, say if the deceased caught an infection while in the hospital and the infection killed her, that might reduce the defendant's liability. (On the other hand, it might not. It will depend on the facts of the case. I'm just highlighting legal issues here.) Other potential claims will depend on the facts of the case. If, for example, the deceased was walking with her family when the child on the bicycle struck her, those family members might have claims in their own right for physical or emotional harms they suffered.
Lastly, the issue of who will actually pay is very simple. This child is not going to pay herself. This child is not going to jail. Standard homeowner's insurance includes a general liability policy which covers damages in civil lawsuits. The fact that the suit was even brought in the first place indicates that the defendant's family almost certainly has such a policy because it would make no economic sense to sue absent them having one. (In civil suits, insurance money is very easy to get. As a plaintiff, you really don't want to have to deal with getting liens on property, garnishing wages or seizing bank accounts. One can do it, to be sure, but then you have to get into other considerations of what the state law will allow you to take, and you actually have to get your hands on the property/money to seize it. Often, if their isn't a ready supply of insurance money to go after, plaintiffs will elect not to sue.)
By the way, this is not news. This is a sad story that got picked up by some media outlet because most members of the media (to say nothing of most people in the United States) don't understand the common law of negligence that is applied in state courts.
Re:What is the point? (Score:4, Informative)
Actually when I was 5 years old I was allowed to play outside unsupervised, as long as I didn't cross any major streets [google.com] and came back if my parents blew the whistle that they used for the purpose.
Re:Supposed to do? (Score:3, Informative)
So how exactly can you avoid a collision unless you are on the bike? (or holding your child with a leash?)
Re:Supposed to do? (Score:3, Informative)
>The truth is that this was an accident.
It could still be medical malpractice. The reports dwell on the kid, and don't say much about the fact that the victim died a significant time after receiving medical care. I wonder if the judge is allowing the case to go forward so that more attention can be cast on other details.
Doubtful. An 87 year old who suffered a hip fracture has a 50-50 chance of dying in the next year no matter how good the medical care. Yep, we can fix hip fractures - but it's a big, big stress to the system and lots of people can't hack it.
Re:Wait what? (Score:3, Informative)
They don't have the part of the brain that you would use to make such a decision.
Whoa, no way.
Maybe you're referring to how the prefrontal cortex, region of executive control, is underdeveloped? And anyway, that just means that they have a hard time controlling themselves, not that they can't plan or perform evil.
Re:Pardon my language and lack of depth, but.. (Score:1, Informative)
> And stores dont accept large bills?
Cash isn't so much used in the USA any longer. People use it for small transactions, but most purchases over $5 or $10 at stores are done with a debit or credit card.
Re:Wait what? (Score:4, Informative)
They don't have the part of the brain that you would use to make such a decision.
Whoa, no way.
Maybe you're referring to how the prefrontal cortex, region of executive control, is underdeveloped? And anyway, that just means that they have a hard time controlling themselves, not that they can't plan or perform evil.
No, actually they really "can't plan" at that age :) Proper planning needs (beyond impulse control) a) a proper sense of time (usually developed at around 6 years) and b) proper reasoning (mostly developed at about 12-13, but isn't finished until the "kid" is about 18). And I would argue that doing evil needs a proper grasp of the concept of death, which usually develops at around 9.
For sources see the works of Piaget on developmental psychology.
Re:Wait what? (Score:2, Informative)
It actually does mean they can't plan evil. Within the Piaget model, children do not form the processes necessary to reasonably determine the consequences of their actions and furthermore do not have an understanding of right and wrong beyond an egocentric level.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_cognitive_development#Preoperational_stage [wikipedia.org]
But you're right about the brain matter thing.
Re:Wait what? (Score:5, Informative)
No, wait. Someone set us right further down - the NY "Supreme Court" is misleadingly named; there's actually several NY supreme courts, which are first-line trial courts in that state. So this is just a low-level judge who made a wacky decision.
The top court in NY is the Court of Appeals.
Re:Age of consent (Score:3, Informative)
Re:What is the point? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:What is the point? (Score:2, Informative)
In this particular case the law is working as intended. This judge has not stated if the child is negligent, guilty or anything of that nature. Instead they simply ruled on the current law which states that in their district of operation no child under the age of 4 may be sued. The suit may proceed as to determine liability, damages etc. and that is all the judge was ruling on.
Re:Wait what? (Score:5, Informative)
Just curious... Are you referring to this incident [dispatch.com] that occurred in Jackson, Ohio? In that case, there were no fatalities. Just some minor pellet wounds for the babysitter and a bystander.
As for the child, he definitely showed that he had fairly advanced fine motor skills and was able to display excellent memory recall (either through learning by repetition or by watching adults). However, he wasn't able to distinguish between a real firearm and a toy gun, and probably didn't appreciate the difference (or consequences). He also didn't exhibit much planning ability. The whole thing was pretty spur-of-the-moment.
This is fairly normal development for kids in the four-year old range. It's right at that transitory area between two of Piaget's stages: pre-operational vs. concrete operations. At that age, kids are already physically able to do some fairly complex things, but are only beginning to understand the consequences of negative actions and concepts. I think most people have noticed that this is around the age when kids begin to actively lie, bully, cheat, etc. So, it's hard to say what his motive was, other than to express his disapproval with the babysitter.
(Note: I'm trying not to talk out of my ass. The above was written after consulting my spousal unit; she has an MA in clinical child psychology and works with developmentally-challenged kids.)
By the way, I'm not sure that I believe the incident went down exactly as reported. According to articles that I read on other news sites, there was a fairly large group of kids in the mobile home, ranging from infants up to late-teens. The alternative theory is that the teens were goofing around with the shotgun when it accidentally went off, then laying the blame on the four-year old.
Re:What is the point? (Score:3, Informative)
Lets just ignore that she's 89 years old and would've died soon, probably in the same way too as falling over is quite a common occurrence; only this time they have a finger to point for hospital fees, if it weren't the child it'd be the owner of a mall or the maker of her shoes etc.
So as far as my argument of socialized health care? Shit happens and people need medical treatment, it's a basic and universal need for *everybody* in the world.