Responsibility

[customloaded]

Last evening, Sunday Jul 26th, 2009, I saw a show on Dateline I think. Don't watch much TV so bear with me. The meat and potatoes of the show was about a young woman in her early 20's who was abducted out of her home, leaving two small children under the age of three. Husband came home to find her missing. She was eventually raped and shot in the head. The suspect was caught not long after he killed her but took two days to find her body.

The gist of the story was that the Sheriff's office in Florida was responsible for her death. A lawsuit has been filed. Reason: There were four (4) 911 calls within 30 minutes of each other, one from the victim who was able to get the killers cell phone and spoke to 911 for 9 minutes, and three from witnesses. One witness thought it was a child abuse case and offered to follow the vehicle until it was stopped by police. The 911 operator was able to link the car description from the caller and matched it to the BOLO of the kidnapping suspect. However, this info was never put into the computer system or broadcast to officer's who were litterally within one block of the suspect car and witness.

Obviously there was some mistakes made on behalf of LE. My point and questions pertain to how much responsibility lies on the victim for allowing a man in her home? No forced entry. He allowed her to shut all the house windows so the kids wouldn't get out. She was actually able to get out of the car at one point, in a public place, but did not run. How much is on the husband for not having taken defensive precautions for his stay at home wife and kids?

I'm seeking some feed back on this...I think its wrong to put it all on the blame on the Sheriff's office. Where is the personal responsibility of the victim and husband? Do not take it out of context or assume I'm blaming the victim, I'm not. I fully realize that the kidnapper, rapist, murderer choose her and made her a victim. It lies 100% on him but to what extent does the sheriff office have responsibility vs the individual person who willingly goes with a man she allowed in her house. A man whom she did not know? She did not offer resistance, she did not fight back...she was not tied and bound until after he got her to his house. she was 100% mobile in her home and his car until the arrival at his house.

The 911 operator yelled out the info about the witness follwing the suspect car to the police dispatchers instead of putting it in the computer system. All the dispatchers heard it but all assumed someone else was actually putting the info on the air. As a result, it was never documented in the computer nor put out on the air.

Where do we draw the line on sueing an agency for something when its our own individual responsibility for our own safety. Just wondering....

[FormerUser123]

This seems to be a tragedy of errors on the police's part and I can understand wanting to file suit over it. They failed in multiple ways to do their jobs, according to your synopsis, and their failure led to a wife and mother of two to be senselessly raped and executed. This is one of those crimes that never had to happen, and should have easily been stopped. The police can't be everywhere all the time, we all know this, but when the police are there and fail to act, yes it's time to file suit against the agency.

[Willtallica]

The police are responsible for your safety, and protection, but they do help.

Sadly incidents like this are probably reoccurring as so is tyranny.

[shefearsnothing]

Where do we draw the line on sueing an agency for something when its our own individual responsibility for our own safety. Just wondering....

Oh I don't know....where are they going to draw the line on tramping on our rights to do so? So many of us work so hard to take the necessary steps to take that responsibility and then we have the IIC working against us raping us of every right and freedom in every way they can think of.

Sure there may have been things that could have been done differently here. You see it from the outside though. She let him in. Maybe he posed as a police officer? Maybe he had a key and that detail was never uncovered? But hey, maybe this family should have had a dog or an alarm system?

He allowed her to shut the windows. Ok, what does that have to do with anything? So he didn't want to add any other charges to his sheet if something happened to those kids. He was in it for rape and murder. Hell, maybe he hadn't planned on killing her in the first place. Rape is about power and control. The kids have nothing to do with it.

She got out of the car in a public place but did not run. Wasn't there. Couldn't say what those circumstances were. Hell, the guy knew where she lived so I can only imagine what she was thinking. I mean, where would she go? I know the first place I'd want to go is home to my kids but guess where he'd come looking for her? He'd get there a hell of a lot faster in his car, no? (Yes, I realize it would be most prudent to get to a phone but I'm sitting here typing this while not in distress from the comfort of my home. Trying to pose it as a victim may have thought. Racing thoughts, want to get home to kids. No, can't do that. He will look for me there. Panic. And the next thing you know, he has her again.) I'm sure she didn't stand around wanting to be raped and murdered so her husband could collect some money later. (not saying that's what you're implying; just throwing it out there.)

She was 100% mobile? Is it possible she was in a state of shock and was not as mobile as you may believe? Again, I am sure she didn't just say "oh well. Might as well just give up and go with it."

[d90king]

Sadly this will sum it up...

The Police: No Duty To Protect Individuals
(Warren v. D.C.)


The Court's Decision: Appellants Carolyn Warren, Miriam Douglas, and Joan Taliaferro in No. 79-6, and appellant Wilfred Nichol in No. 79-394 sued the District of Columbia and individual members of the Metropolitan Police Department for negligent failure to provide adequate police services. The respective trial judges held that the police were under no specific legal duty to provide protection to the individual appellants and dismissed the complaints for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. Super.Ct.Civ.R. 12(b)(6). However, in a split decision a three-judge division of this court determined that appellants Warren, Taliaferro and Nichol were owed a special duty of care by the police department and reversed the trial court rulings.

The division unanimously concluded that appellant Douglas failed to fit within the class of persons to whom a special duty was owed, and affirmed the lower court's dismissal of her complaint. The court en banc, on petitions for rehearing, vacated the panel's decision. After rearguments, notwithstanding our sympathy for appellants who were the tragic victims of despicable criminal acts, we affirm the judgments of dismissal.

Appeal No. 79-6

The Gruesome Facts of the Case: In the early morning hours of March 16, 1975, appellants Carolyn Warren, Joan Taliaferro, and Miriam Douglas were asleep in their rooming house at 1112 Lamont Street, N.W. Warren and Taliaferro shared a room on the third floor of the house; Douglas shared a room on the second floor with her four-year-old daughter. The women were awakened by the sound of the back door being broken down by two men later identified as Marvin Kent and James Morse. The men entered Douglas' second floor room, where Kent forced Douglas to sodomize him and Morse raped her.

Warren and Taliaferro heard Douglas' screams from the floor below. Warren telephoned the police, told the officer on duty that the house was being burglarized, and requested immediate assistance. The department employee told her to remain quiet and assured her that police assistance would be dispatched promptly.

Warren's call was received at Metropolitan Police Department Headquarters at 6:23 a. m., and was recorded as a burglary in progress. At 6:26 a.m., a call was dispatched to officers on the street as a "Code 2" assignment, although calls of a crime in progress should be given priority and designated as "Code 1." Four police cruisers responded to the broadcast; three to the Lamont Street address and one to another address to investigate a possible suspect.

Meanwhile, Warren and Taliaferro crawled from their window onto an adjoining roof and waited for the police to arrive. While there, they saw one policeman drive through the alley behind their house and proceed to the front of the residence without stopping, leaning out the window, or getting out of the car to check the back entrance of the house. A second officer apparently knocked on the door in front of the residence, but left when he received no answer. The three officers departed the scene at 6:33 a.m., five minutes after they arrived.

Warren and Taliaferro crawled back inside their room. They again heard Douglas' continuing screams; again called the police; told the officer that the intruders had entered the home, and requested immediate assistance. Once again, a police officer assured them that help was on the way. This second call was received at 6:42 a. m. and recorded merely as "investigate the trouble" -- it was never dispatched to any police officers.

Believing the police might be in the house, Warren and Taliaferro called down to Douglas, thereby alerting Kent to their presence. Kent and Morse then forced all three women, at knifepoint, to accompany them to Kent's apartment. For the next fourteen hours the women were held captive, raped, robbed, beaten, forced to commit sexual acts upon each other, and made to submit to the sexual demands of Kent and Morse.

Appellants' claims of negligence included: the dispatcher's failure to forward the 6:23 a.m. call with the proper degree of urgency; the responding officers' failure to follow standard police investigative procedures, specifically their failure to check the rear entrance and position themselves properly near the doors and windows to ascertain whether there was any activity inside; and the dispatcher's failure to dispatch the 6:42 a. m. call.

Appeal No. 79-394

No Duty to Protect: On April 30, 1978, at approximately 11:30 p.m., appellant Nichol stopped his car for a red light at the intersection of Missouri Avenue and Sixteenth Street, N.W. Unknown occupants in a vehicle directly behind appellant struck his car in the rear several times, and then proceeded to beat appellant about the face and head breaking his jaw.

A Metropolitan Police Department officer arrived at the scene. In response to the officer's direction, appellant's companion ceased any further efforts to obtain identification information of the assailants. When the officer then failed to get the information, leaving Nichol unable to institute legal action against his assailants, Nichol brought a negligence action against the officer, the Metropolitan Police Department and the District of Columbia.

The trial judges correctly dismissed both complaints. In a carefully reasoned Memorandum Opinion, Judge Hannon based his decision in No. 79-6 on "the fundamental principle that a government and its agents are under no general duty to provide public services, such as police protection, to any particular individual citizen." See p. 4, infra. The duty to provide public services is owed to the public at large, and, absent a special relationship between the police and an individual, no specific legal duty exists. Holding that no special relationship existed between the police and appellants in No. 79-6, Judge Hannon concluded that no specific legal duty existed. We hold that Judge Hannon was correct and adopt the relevant portions of his opinion. Those portions appear in the following Appendix.[fn1]

Judge Pryor, then of the trial court, ruled likewise in No. 79-394 on the basis of Judge Hannon's opinion. In No. 79-394, a police officer directed Nichol's companion to cease efforts to identify the assailants and thus to break off the violent confrontation. The officer's duty to get that identification was one directly related to his official and general duty to investigate the offenses. His actions and failings were solely related to his duty to the public generally and possessed no additional element necessary to create an overriding special relationship and duty.[fn2]

Here the effort to separate the hostile assailants from the victims -- a necessary part of the on-scene responsibility of the police -- adds nothing to the general duty owed the public and fails to create a relationship which imposes a special legal duty such as that created when there is a course of conduct, special knowledge of possible harm, or the actual use of individuals in the investigation. See Falco v. City of New York, 34 A.D.2d 673, 310 N.Y.S.2d 524 (App. Div. 1970), aff'd, 29 N.Y.2d 918, 329 N.Y.S.2d 97, 279 N.E.2d 854 (1972) (police officer's Page 4 statement to injured motorcyclist that he would obtain name of motorist who struck the motorcycle was a gratuitous promise and did not create a special legal duty); Jackson v. Heyman, 126 N.J. Super. 281, 314 A.2d 82 (Super.Ct.Law Div. 1973) (police officers' investigation of vehicle accident where pedestrian was a minor child did not create a special legal duty to child's parents who were unsuccessful in their attempt to recover damages because police failed to identify drivers of vehicle). We hold that Judge Pryor did not err in dismissing No. 79-394 for failure to state a claim.

In either case, it is easy to condemn the failings of the police. However, the desire for condemnation cannot satisfy the need for a special relationship out of which a duty to specific persons arises. In neither of these cases has a relationship been alleged beyond that found in general police responses to crimes. Civil liability fails as a matter of law.

[CommonHighrise]

Sadly this will sum it up...

The Police: No Duty To Protect Individuals

Then they need to STFU about civilians arming themselves. They cannot force an unarmed populace on us, than duck the duty of protecting us.

I respect most cops. While it's not a realistic situation to find myself in, I'd gladly stand shoulder to shoulder with them in a firefight. But not if they've taken away my gin first.

[d90king]

Then they need to STFU about civilians arming themselves. They cannot force an unarmed populace on us, than duck the duty of protecting us.

I respect most cops. While it's not a realistic situation to find myself in, I'd gladly stand shoulder to shoulder with them in a firefight. But not if they've taken away my gin first.

Sadly, I don't see them changing their position when it comes to "our" rights and "their" rights...

[knight0334]

The blame is entirely on the badguy. Its his duty to not break the law. The Sheriff or police have no duty or responsibility to the safety or recovery of others.

This world needs to stop blaming the LEO's or loved ones, and put the blame and responsibility on the ones that create the situation.

If anyone feels that someone other than the badguy is to blame, they need blame the person that got killed because. You are solely responsible for your own safety.