School's Immunity Defense Falls Short in Student's After School Incident
by
Joseph C. Maya on Apr. 24, 2017
Other Education Accident & Injury Accident & Injury Personal Injury
Summary: Blog post about the liability of schools when students are injured while on school grounds.
If you have a question or concern about special education law, school administration, federal standards, or the overall rights of a student, please feel free to call the expert education law attorneys at Maya Murphy, P.C. in Westport today at (203) 221-3100 .
In the case of Bunnell v. Potocco, a student and her mother filed suit against school employees based on an incident when the student was struck in the eye by a stick thrown by another student while she was on school grounds waiting for a late bus to take her home. The employees moved for summary judgment on the ground that all of the claims against them were barred by the doctrine of governmental immunity.
The student alleged that her injuries and losses were caused by the negligence of the school employees because no teacher was supervising the students when the incident occurred. The student alleged that the employees' failures rose to the level of ministerial or private duties and/or discretionary duties. Both a student handbook and a school policy manual provided that students, except those placed in detention or participating in extracurricular programs, were to leave the grounds immediately after school and that an authorized person would assume responsibility for those remaining students. The court noted that if a school board had adopted policies or procedures with respect to the issue raised in the complaint, such a duty might have been ministerial. In law, a ministerial duty is an act that conforms to a specific instruction or prescribed procedure, and is performed without the use of judgment by the person performing the act. It is critical to note that, unlike discretionary duties, a ministerial duty is not protected by governmental immunity. The court denied the motion for summary judgment, and found a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the school board had prescribed policies and/or adopted procedures that addressed whether a teacher's presence at the time and place of the incident was ministerial.
If you have a child with a disability and have questions about special education law, please contact Joseph C. Maya, Esq., at 203-221-3100, or at JMaya@mayalaw.com, to schedule a free consultation.
Source: Bunnell v. Potocco, 2007 Conn. Super. LEXIS 1424, 2007 WL 1827831 (Conn. Super. Ct. June 1, 2007)
