Gonzalez v. Johnson

Decision Date13 June 2019
Docket Number2018-SC-000224-DG
Citation581 S.W.3d 529
Parties Luis J. GONZALEZ II, Administrator of the Estate of Luis J. Gonzalez, Appellant v. Jeremy JOHNSON, Individually and in His Official Capacity as Scott County Deputy Sheriff, and Tony Hampton, Individually and in His Official Capacity as Scott County Sheriff, Appellees
CourtUnited States State Supreme Court — District of Kentucky

COUNSEL FOR APPELLANT: William R. Gamier, Lexington, Garmer And Prather, PLLC, Jerome Park Prather, Lexington, Garmer And Prather, PLLC.

COUNSEL FOR APPELLEES: Daniel Barry Stilz, Kinkead & Stilz, PLLC, Robert Coleman Stilz III, Lexington, Kinkead & Stilz, PLLC, Lynn Sowards Zellen, Frankfort, Kinkead & Stilz, PLLC, Jonathan Fannin, Lexington, Kinkead & Stilz, PPLC.

COUNSEL FOR AMICUS CURIAE KENTUCKY LEAGUE OF CITIES, INC., Spencer D. Noe, Gess, Mattingly & Atchison, P.S.C., Donald Markam Wakefield, Gess, Mattingly & Atchison, P.S.C.

COUNSEL FOR AMICUS CURIAE KENTUCKY JUSTICE ASSOCIATION: Kevin Crosby Burke, Louisville, Burke Neal PLLC, Jamie Kristin Neal, Burke Neal PLLC.

COUNSEL FOR AMICUS CURIAE PURSUITSAFETY: Gregory Allen Belzley, Belzley Bathurst Attorneys.

OPINION OF THE COURT BY JUSTICE LAMBERT

Luis Gonzalez was killed when a criminal suspect crashed head-on into his vehicle during a high-speed chase which was initiated by Scott County Deputy Sheriff Jeremy Johnson. Johnson’s vehicle was not involved in the actual collision. Gonzalez's estate filed a wrongful death suit against both Deputy Johnson and Scott County Sheriff Tony Hampton. The Fayette Circuit Court granted summary judgment in favor of Deputy Johnson and Sheriff Hampton based on Chambers v. Ideal Pure Milk Co.,1 and its per se no proximate cause rule. We now overrule Chambers insofar as it holds an officer cannot be the proximate or legal cause of damage inflicted on a third party by a fleeing suspect. We adopt the majority rule that will allow juries to determine whether a pursuing officer’s actions were a substantial factor in causing injury to a third party and apportion fault accordingly.

I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

In January of 2014, officers from the Scott County Sheriff’s Department and the Kentucky State Police joined forces to carry out a sting operation to apprehend a suspected heroin dealer. Their plan was to have a man named Gregory buy from the dealer, and then have a confidential informant buy the heroin from Gregory.

At around 9 p.m. the suspected dealer pulled into the agreed upon meeting place. Deputy Johnson was instructed to conceal his presence during the exchange and wait for a lead officer’s order to perform a traffic stop on the suspect if possible. During this time Deputy Johnson ran the suspect’s license plate number and learned the name of the car’s registered owner.

After the exchange, Gregory identified the dealer as "Chief," an alias used by Kennan McLaughlin. An officer with the Lexington Police Department who was in contact with the lead officers confirmed his identity. Lexington Police officers then went to McLaughlin’s home in Fayette County to stake it out.

Meanwhile, Johnson witnessed McLaughlin run a red light and, without authorization, began to pursue him. A litany of things went wrong with the pursuit. To begin, it had been raining, making the well-traveled road slippery. Further, the cruiser Deputy Johnson was using that evening was a K-9 unit, and K-9 Officer Hugo was in the back seat. The partition in the cruiser was unlocked, and the restless dog was able to poke his head through the partition into the front seat. Finally, while the lights on Deputy Johnson’s cruiser were functioning, the siren was not. Deputy Johnson claimed he did not realize the siren was broken until two miles into the pursuit. He testified that, though he knew pursing a suspect without his siren violated KRS 2 189.940 and the Scott Co. Sheriff Dept.’s practices, he continued the pursuit for about another mile.

As McLaughlin and Deputy Johnson were approaching an S-curve, they both slowed down. It was at this time that Johnson assessed the situation and decided to terminate the pursuit. But, almost immediately after he decided to stop pursuing McLaughlin, he saw McLaughlin’s car fishtail out of control and hit what Johnson thought was the guardrail. Tragically, McLaughlin actually hit the decedent Luis Gonzalez's car. Luis was pronounced dead at the scene. Geneva Spencer, the driver, also later died due to her injuries.

Gonzalez's estate filed a wrongful death suit against both Deputy Johnson and Tony Hampton, the Scott Co. Sheriff. Before discovery was complete, the trial court granted summary judgment in Deputy Johnson and Sheriff Hampton’s favor. The court found that, based on Chambers, Deputy Johnson’s actions were not the proximate or legal cause of Gonzalez's death as a matter of law. The Court of Appeals also held that it was bound by Chambers and reluctantly affirmed.

The single issue presented by this appeal is whether this Court should abandon the per se no proximate cause rule established by Chambers. Based on the following, we reverse.

II. PER SE NO PROXIMATE CAUSE RULE

"Appellate review of a summary judgment involves only legal questions and a determination of whether a disputed material issue of fact exists. So we operate under a de novo standard of review with no need to defer to the trial court's decision."3

For the purposes of a wrongful death suit such as this one, KRS 411.130(1) provides: "Whenever the death of a person results from an injury inflicted by the negligence or wrongful act of another, damages may be recovered for the death from the person who caused it, or whose agent or servant caused it." To demonstrate that the defendant was negligent a plaintiff must show that (1) the defendant owed the plaintiff a duty of care; (2) the defendant breached that duty of care; (3) a causal connection between the defendant’s conduct and the plaintiffs damages; and (4) damages.4 The causal connection element is composed of two elements:

Cause-in-fact and legal or consequential causation. Cause-in-fact involves the factual chain of events leading to the injury; whereas, consequential causation concerns the concepts of foreseeability and the public policy consideration on limiting the scope of responsibility for damages. In Kentucky, the cause-in-fact component has been redefined as a "substantial factor" element as expressed in Restatement (Second) of Torts § 431. The scope of duty also includes a foreseeability component involving whether the risk of injury was reasonably foreseeable.5

In Chambers, this Court held that a police officer’s actions could, as a matter of law, never be the proximate or legal cause of damages suffered by a third party struck by a fleeing suspect.6

Like here, the police cruiser in Chambers did not contact the plaintiff-occupied vehicle. Officers Robert Chambers and Jack Long were patrolling in their cruiser at 3 a.m. and noticed a man named Wren Shearer sitting in a parked car. Id. at 590. The policemen were familiar with Shearer’s criminal record and believed him to be a "suspicious character." Id. They turned their cruiser around to investigate, and Shearer fled. Id. During the officers' pursuit the cruiser’s lights and siren were on and the officers "fired shots into the air in an effort to halt Shearer." Id. The speeding Shearer hit a horse-drawn milk wagon owned by Ideal Pure Milk Co. while it was making a left turn. Id. at 589-90. A jury ruled in favor of Ideal Milk and awarded damages. Id. at 590.

On appeal, Officers Chambers and Long argued for reversal on the basis that they were not the proximate cause of the damage to the wagon or its driver. Id. This Court agreed and held:

To argue that the officers' pursuit caused Shearer to speed may be factually true, but it does not follow that the officers are liable at law for the results of Shearer’s negligent speed. Police cannot be made insurers of the conducts of the culprits they chase. It is our conclusion that the action of the police was not the legal or proximate cause of the accident, and that the jury should have been instructed to find for the appellants.

Id. at 591 (emphasis added). This was the entirety of the holding on the matter. The Chambers court provided no statutory support or legal precedent to defend this bare conclusion, and was thus, judge-made law. Nonetheless, based on the Chambers holding, Kentucky began to apply what is commonly referred to as the per se no proximate cause rule. Because of this, our trial courts and juries were precluded from ever finding that police officers were the cause of any damage suffered by a third party who is hit by a fleeing suspect.7

Today, sixty-Seven years post- Chambers , Kentucky finds itself in a nearly non-existent minority of states that have such a per se no proximate cause rule. The following is a non-exhaustive list of states that do not: Seals v. City of Columbia, 575 So.2d 1061 (Ala. 1991) ; Estate of Aten v. City of Tucson, 169 Ariz. 147, 817 P.2d 951 (Ariz. Ct. App. 1991) ; City of Caddo Valley v. George, 340 Ark. 203, 9 S.W.3d 481 (2000) ; Tetro v. Town of Stratford, 189 Conn. 601, 458 A.2d 5 (1983) ; Jones v. Crawford, 1 A.3d 299 (Del. 2010) ; City of Pinellas Park v. Brown, 604 So. 2d 1222 (Fla. 1992) ; Mixon v. City of Warner Robins, 264 Ga. 385, 444 S.E.2d 761 (1994) ; Athay v. Stacey, 142 Idaho 360, 128 P.3d 897 (2005) ; Suwanski v. Village of Lombard, 342 Ill.App.3d 248, 276 Ill.Dec. 766, 794 N.E.2d 1016 (2003) ; City of Indianapolis v. Earl, 960 N.E.2d 868 (Ind. Ct. App. 2012) ; Morris v. Leaf, 534 N.W.2d 388 (Iowa 1995) ; Robbins v. City of Wichita, 285 Kan. 455, 172 P.3d 1187 (2007) ; Boyer v. State, 323 Md. 558, 594 A.2d 121 (1991) ; Harrison v. Town of Mattapoisett, 78 Mass.App.Ct. 367, 937 N.E.2d 514 (2010) ; Smith v. City of West Point, 475 So. 2d 816 (Miss. 1985) (overruling on different grounds recognized by Jackson v. Daley, 739 So.2d 1031 (Miss. 1999) ); Moody v....

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