Sanchez v. State of NY

Citation784 N.E.2d 675,754 N.Y.S.2d 621,99 N.Y.2d 247
PartiesFRANCISCO SANCHEZ, Appellant, v. STATE OF NEW YORK, Respondent.
Decision Date21 November 2002
CourtNew York Court of Appeals

John D.B. Lewis, New York City, and Gary E. Divis for appellant.

Eliot Spitzer, Attorney General, Albany (Frank K. Walsh, Caitlin J. Halligan, Daniel Smirlock and Peter H. Schiff of counsel), for respondent.

Daniel L. Greenberg, Brooklyn, John Boston, Mary Lynne Werlwas; Tom Terrizzi, Ithaca, Betsy Sterling; and Alfred O'Connor, Albany, for Legal Aid Society of City of New York and others, amici curiae.

Judges SMITH, LEVINE, CIPARICK and ROSENBLATT concur with Chief Judge KAYE; Judge GRAFFEO dissents and votes to affirm the granting of the State's motion for summary judgment in a separate opinion in which Judge WESLEY concurs.

OPINION OF THE COURT

Chief Judge KAYE.

In this inmate-on-inmate assault case, appellant Francisco Sanchez's negligent supervision claim against the State was dismissed on summary judgment, on the ground that the attack was unforeseeable as a matter of law. We conclude that this record raises a triable issue as to foreseeability.

The essential facts are undisputed. On December 14, 1995, two unidentified fellow inmates in Elmira Correctional Facility, a maximum security prison, attacked Sanchez. The attack occurred on the second floor of a school building the prison used for inmate evening programs. On the night of the assault, one correction officer was assigned to supervise approximately 100 inmates in the school area.1 The officer's individual security post description, which set out his responsibilities for the evening, required him to "remain alert and monitor Inmates' Behavior * * * to prevent or stop assaults on * * * Inmates."

The officer was stationed at a desk at one end of a 60-foot long corridor, off which were six classrooms, with a storage room at the opposite end of the corridor. Perpendicular to the main corridor, near the officer's desk, was a shorter hallway leading to two additional classrooms and an open stairwell where inmates were allowed to smoke. From his desk, the officer could see down the long hallway and, by virtue of a wall-mounted mirror, he could also see down the shorter hallway. Sanchez and a civilian were in a classroom off the shorter hallway, conducting a class on Latino culture.

At the time of the attack, the inmates were all preparing for "go-back," or return to their housing units. As a leader of his class, Sanchez was required to clean up his classroom and then stand just outside the doorway to await inspection and release by the officer.

As was his routine, the correction officer at the close of classes left his desk and was at the storage room at the opposite end of the corridor, supervising inmates returning television sets and other equipment. From the storage room, he was unable to see the hallway where Sanchez was required to stand awaiting inspection. Without warning, Sanchez was punched and slashed across his face from behind with a razor-like instrument, causing a wound that required 40 stitches. The attack lasted less than 20 seconds, and the officer came to Sanchez's aid less than one minute after the attack. In his deposition, Sanchez testified that he was completely surprised by the attack and had no reason to believe he was going to be attacked.

Sanchez brought a claim against the State for negligent supervision, and the State sought summary judgment on the ground that the attack was not foreseeable. In support of his claim, Sanchez submitted the affidavit of an expert witness, who opined that the State's supervision of Sanchez on the night of the assault violated generally accepted penological standards of care including the following:

The State failed to provide "active supervision" while the inmates were in a congregate setting outside the housing area, in violation of rational and effective standards of penological supervision.2
• No security can be provided by one officer in a school area that has corridors of 60 or more feet in length, that has at least nine rooms (as here), that is configured so as to contain a "T" intersection which precludes total visual surveillance of the area, and that is occupied by 101 inmates.
• The officer, standing at least 60 feet from Sanchez, was not able to prevent assaults or immediately respond to emergency situations, and was not reasonably able to control the activities in the area where Sanchez was assaulted.
"Go-back," a time of great inmate movement, is a notorious time for inmate-on-inmate assaults, and the officer positioned himself where he was unable to provide any sort of supervision.
• The officer's habitual practice of going to the storeroom during "go-back" while requiring certain inmates (like Sanchez) to remain in front of their classrooms awaiting discharge, gave the assailant an opportunity to carry out the assault.

These assertions were not disputed by the State.

The Court of Claims granted the State's motion for summary judgment and denied Sanchez's cross-motion for summary judgment. The Appellate Division affirmed, stating that in inmate assault cases, proof of foreseeability essential to a negligence claim requires a showing: (1) that the State knew the victim was at risk and failed to take reasonable steps to protect him or her; (2) that the State knew the assailant was dangerous but failed to protect other inmates from him or her; or (3) that the State had both notice and the opportunity to intervene for the purpose of protecting the victim but failed to do so. In the Court's view, claimant's testimony that the attack came as a complete surprise to him itself negated notice to the State and an opportunity to protect him. Lacking proof of notice, the Appellate Division granted the State's summary judgment motion and dismissed Sanchez's negligent supervision claim. We now reinstate the claim.

Discussion

"The law is clear; it is only in its application that difficulty is encountered" (Flaherty v State of New York, 296 NY 342, 346 [1947]). That astute perception has particular resonance in the appeal before us.

A defendant stands liable in negligence only for breach of a duty of care owed to the plaintiff (see Pulka v Edelman, 40 NY2d 781, 782 [1976]

). The existence and scope of an alleged tortfeasor's duty is, in the first instance, a legal question for determination by the courts (see Di Ponzio v Riordan, 89 NY2d 578, 583 [1997]). Regardless of the status of the plaintiff, the scope of the duty owed by the defendant is defined by the risk of harm reasonably to be perceived (see Basso v Miller, 40 NY2d 233, 241 [1976]). In words familiar to every first-year law student, "[t]he risk reasonably to be perceived defines the duty to be obeyed" (Palsgraf v Long Is. R.R. Co., 248 NY 339, 344 [1928]). Although the precise manner in which the harm occurred need not be foreseeable, liability does not attach unless the harm is within the class of reasonably foreseeable hazards that the duty exists to prevent (see Di Ponzio, 89 NY2d at 584).

These fundamental propositions apply with equal force to negligence claims against the State for inmate injuries sustained in assaults occurring in correctional facilities. Having assumed physical custody of inmates, who cannot protect and defend themselves in the same way as those at liberty can, the State owes a duty of care to safeguard inmates, even from attacks by fellow inmates (see Flaherty, 296 NY at 346; Restatement [Second] of Torts § 320).3 That duty does not, however, render the State an insurer of inmate safety. Like other duties in tort, the scope of the State's duty to protect inmates is limited to risks of harm that are reasonably foreseeable (see Flaherty, 296 NY at 346; Wilson v State of New York, 36 AD2d 559 [1971]).

In Flaherty v State of New York (296 NY 342), this Court directly addressed the element of foreseeability in inmate-on-inmate attacks. There, an inmate at a juvenile rehabilitation facility, during the early morning hours, had obtained a cylinder of acid from a fire extinguisher and poured it over the sleeping victim's head. The Court dismissed the victim's negligence claim against the State on the ground that the assault was not reasonably foreseeable, recognizing that the State—like any other party—is responsible only for hazards reasonably to be perceived. As we held, there was no notice to the State that the victim was in danger, or that the assailant was dangerous, and no basis for concluding from factors such as the ratio of supervisors or the institution's experience that the State was derelict in its supervision of the inmates. "Short of constant guarding and watching—unreasonable under the circumstances—the authorities could not have prevented so furtive and secret a deed" (id. at 346-347).

Similarly, in Gordon v City of New York (70 NY2d 839 [1987]), involving an inmate who intentionally injured himself in a holding pen, this Court reversed a jury verdict for plaintiff on the ground that he failed to establish foreseeability. In so concluding, the Court again looked to the defendant's knowledge, with respect to both the injured inmate and the institution's prior experience, determining that "the actions taken with regard to plaintiff were reasonable under the circumstances and that every possible precaution had been taken to guard against what was reasonably foreseeable" (id. at 841).

Here, the Appellate Division used a different test, requiring proof that the State actually knew that the particular victim was vulnerable to assault or the particular assailant was dangerous, or that the State actually knew that the assault was about to take place and had an opportunity to intervene and protect the victim. The State urges that this test is simply a distillation of the familiar, long-established principles for determining foreseeability. We disagree.

The strict requirement of...

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