Williams v. Utica College of Syracuse University, Docket No. 05-1898-CV.

Citation453 F.3d 112
Decision Date28 June 2006
Docket NumberDocket No. 05-1898-CV.
PartiesHollie M. WILLIAMS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. UTICA COLLEGE OF SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY, and Burns International Security Services Corp., Defendants-Appellants.
CourtUnited States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (2nd Circuit)

Michael W. Harris of Harris & Panels, Syracuse, N.Y., for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Bartle J. Gorman of Gorman, Wasziewicz, Gorman & Schmitt, Utica, N.Y., for Defendant-Respondent Utica College of Syracuse University.

J. Mark McCarthy of Coulter, Ventre & McCarthy, Liverpool, N.Y., for Defendant-Respondent Bums International Security Services Corp.

Before: CALABRESI, B.D. PARKER, and WESLEY, Circuit Judges.

CALABRESI, Circuit Judge.

This appeal challenges a grant of summary judgment against Plaintiff-Appellant Hollie M. Williams ("Appellant" or "Williams"), who had originally brought negligence actions against Defendants-Appellees Utica College of Syracuse University ("Utica College") and Burns International Security Services Corporation ("Burns Security") after she was assaulted in her dormitory room by an unidentified assailant. The United States District Court for the Northern District of New York (Mordue, J.) dismissed Williams' suit at summary judgment on the grounds (1) that the risk of the attack on Williams was not foreseeable (and therefore that Appellees' duty to protect against the risk could not be established); (2) that there was insufficient evidence that the assailant was an intruder who had obtained access to Williams' room through a negligently-maintained entrance (and therefore that cause could not be shown); and (3) that the security measures adopted by Utica College were sufficient, as a matter of law, so that a breach of duty could not be demonstrated by the evidence.

On appeal, while abandoning her claim against Burns Security, Williams continues to argue that Utica College acted negligently, and that its negligence was the cause of her injury. Accordingly, she challenges the District Court's grant of summary judgment as to the college. For the reasons we give below, we conclude that the District Court erred in its analysis of duty and breach. But, because we agree that Williams failed to present sufficient evidence to survive summary judgment as to causation, we affirm the grant of summary judgment.

BACKGROUND

Nestled in upstate New York, Utica College had a student body (in 1999) of over 2000 students, 775 of whom lived in one of five on-campus dormitories. During her sophomore year, Williams shared a room on the second floor of North Hall, where, on October 26, 1999, she and her roommate — also a sophomore — were assaulted by a masked, unknown attacker. Late that morning, at around 11:30 a.m., Williams and her roommate returned to their dorm room and began to prepare lunch, leaving their door slightly ajar. Moments after they returned, a male entered the room and locked the door behind him; he had a gun that was plainly visible. The attacker threatened Williams by pressing a knife against her neck. After forcing Williams to undress and kiss her roommate, he fondled and physically rubbed up against both roommates, never removing his clothes or mask. The assailant left Williams' dorm room approximately thirty minutes after he arrived, having bound his victims' wrists to a bed with duct tape. Williams and her roommate reported that their attacker had seemingly recorded much of what transpired with a video camera he brought to the room.

According to Williams' description, the assailant was a 5'10" white male with short, "strawberry colored hair." Dressed in a black sweater and carrying a gym bag, he had covered his face with a bandana during the encounter. Neither Williams nor her roommate recognized the assailant, and to this day, the individual has not been identified.

At the time of the attack, Utica College had in place a security policy requiring, with one exception, that all outer doors to its five residential halls be locked 24 hours a day. The exception was that during office hours, a "breezeway" entrance remained open, thereby allowing students to enter North Hall from the open quadrangle created by the four other student dormitories. During the day, this entrance was supposed to be monitored by work-study students. Utica College officials could not confirm, however, that anyone manned this post on the day of Williams' assault, and Williams and her roommate testified that they did not see anyone watching over the breezeway entrance when they returned to their room that morning.

The "Campus Security" section of the College Student Handbook, which is distributed annually to all students, outlined the school's official policy:

Residence hall outer doors are locked 24 hours a day with the exception of the breezeway door closest to the Residence Life Office in North Hall. . . . Security officers are stationed in each residence hall from 11:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m. daily. In addition, these residences are staffed by full-time professional live-in resident directors who are on call 24 hours per day each day. . . . Visitors must register with personnel stationed at residence hall lobby desks. Off-campus guests must be escorted at all times by the residential student he/she is visiting.1

Despite these policies, students reportedly held and even propped open doors to the residence halls so that people could enter without registering.

In July 2002, Williams filed an amended complaint against Appellees. In it, she alleged: "The [October] assault was made possible through the failure of [Appellees] to take reasonable and proper care in training and supervising its personnel; in negligently and carelessly failing to properly train its resident advisors; in affirmatively encouraging students to leave there [sic] dormitory rooms unlocked; in negligently and carelessly allowing said dormitories to be left open and available to anyone without any supervision; in failing to undertake to protect said residents with due knowledge that people had previously entered said premises without authorization or justification; failing to properly train its security personnel; failing to have an adequate plan and in otherwise being negligent and careless in the premises."

In due course (and after discovery), Appellees sought summary judgment against Williams. The District Court granted Appellees' request, dismissing Williams' suit for three separate reasons. First, the court concluded that, because of the low history of violent crime on campus, the type of attack Williams suffered was not foreseeable. Utica College's duty as landlord did not, therefore, extend to the circumstances of her assault. The court stressed that in the four years prior to the attack, there had been "few significant criminal incidents on campus, and, with one exception, no crime involving intruders." The court discounted the February 1995 incident since the assault had been committed by a resident's former boyfriend at a time when the doors to the dorms were permanently unlocked. In addition, the court did not find compelling either student complaints about safety, or the warnings issued by Burns Security, which, in a report, had called for additional protective steps to be taken. The court explained its conclusion with the statement that the college was required to provide "reasonable security, not optimal security."

Second, the court justified its grant of summary judgment on the ground that, because there was no proof that the attacker was an "intruder" from outside the school, Williams could not establish that the alleged negligence was the cause of the assailant's presence in the dorm or the subsequent attack. Thus, the court held that there was insufficient evidence for one to conclude "that it is more likely or more reasonable than not that the criminal who assaulted plaintiff was an intruder who gained access to the premises through the breezeway door."

Finally, even to the extent that Utica College had a legal duty, as the owner and manager of North Hall, "to take reasonable steps to minimize foreseeable danger to those residing on the premises," the District Court decided that Williams' evidence of a breach of whatever duty existed was inadequate to survive summary judgment. In this regard, the court stressed the security precautions seemingly in effect in October 1999. These included "locks and peepholes on all dormitory room doors; locked exterior doors with the exception of the breezeway entrance, which was unlocked during office hours; the arrangement of the Residential Life Office so that during office hours, the occupant of the front desk could see out into the hall; and the contract with [Burns Security] to provide campus patrols around the clock and overnight security in each dormitory." On this basis, the District Court found that "the security measures maintained by Utica College fulfilled its security obligations as a matter of law."2 (emphasis added)

DISCUSSION

To prevail on a motion for summary judgment, the moving party must prove that there are no genuine issues of material fact and that it is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. See Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986); Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c). "A dispute regarding a material fact is genuine if the evidence is such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party," Stuart v. Am. Cyanamid Co., 158 F.3d 622, 626 (2d Cir. 1998) (internal quotation marks omitted), drawing all reasonable inferences in favor of that party, Allen v. Coughlin, 64 F.3d 77, 79 (2d Cir.1995). We review de novo a district court's grant of summary judgment. See McCarthy v. Am. Int'l Group, 283 F.3d 121, 123 (2d Cir.2002).

Both parties seemingly agree, and we therefore assume, that New York law governs this diversity action. In order to establish a prima facie case of negligence under that state's cases, a claimant must...

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