Government Immunity

May 17, 2022

Boston Subway Death Attributed to Equipment Failure and Operator Error

shutterstock_429248770-300x200 Commuters who use public transit in Massachusetts should be able to count on a general level of safety while using the public services. Although not all accidents or injuries can be prevented, it is reasonable for members of the public to expect basic and consistent protections when using potentially dangerous transit services. Sometimes, mistakes are made and innocent members of the public are tragically hurt or killed. The National Transportation Safety Board has released a preliminary report on an incident that occurred last month where a man was killed after his arm was stuck in a subway door while the train departed the station.

According to a local news article discussing the incident and subsequent NTSB investigative report, the incident occurred in the early morning hours of April 12 at the Broadway Station on the Red Line MBTA subway. A 39-year-old man was attempting to exit the train when one of his arms became stuck in the door. The man was unable to remove his arm, and the train left the station, dragging the man over 100 feet along the platform and onto a lower surface near the tracks. Once authorities arrived, the man was pronounced dead on the scene.

The NTSB investigation noted that the MBTA trains are designed with a safety feature that would prevent the train from leaving a station if the door was not fully closed. According to the report, there was a “short circuit” in the train’s safety systems, and the error allowed the train to depart with the door open and the passenger stuck outside the train. In addition to the electronic safety features on the train, the article noted that the train operator should ensure that all doors are closed and clear of passengers before departing the station. Because these two independent safety methods failed, a preventable incident became a heartbreaking tragedy.

August 26, 2020

Lawsuits against 3M for hearing loss caused by defective earplugs score major victory

by Neumann Law Group

Soldier-200x300 On July 28, 2020, a Florida federal court ruling breached the central defense against claims certain military earplugs were defective, damaging the ear and causing hearing loss. The lawsuits claim the earplugs were improperly designed, and did not completely block loud noises common to the military, such as gunfire and or the operation of heavy machinery or vehicles. Neumann Law Group has previously written about the earplug litigation, and you can read that article here.

The defendant, 3M, attempted to invoke the ‘government contractor defense,” a doctrine that would relieve it of any liability even if it were proven to have produced and sold a defective product to the military. The Supreme Court articulated the government contractor defense in Boyle v. United Technologies Corporation, 487 US 500 (1988), which involved a wrongful death complaint made against a company that produced military helicopters—the plaintiff alleged the escape system in the helicopter was poorly designed, causing the death of a pilot.

The jury in Boyle found that the manufacturer was in fact negligent when it designed the helicopter, but the Supreme Court would eventually uphold an appellate reversal of the verdict. It outlined the strong federal interest in military equipment and concluded those interests outweighed any state law claims, but only when the federal government gave reasonably precise specifications for the equipment, the equipment conformed to the specifications, and the supplier warned the federal government of the danger involved in using the equipment to the best of its knowledge.

December 3, 2019

Sandy Hook families’ lawsuit against gun manufacturer proceeds: Supreme Court declines to intervene in Connecticut action

by Neumann Law Group

One of the most horrific mass shootings in the nation’s history occurred at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut. The shooter killed 20 children, all between the ages of 6 and 7, as well as 6 adults before killing himself. The families of those killed have brought a number of legal actions in response to the devastating losses they sustained on November 30, 2012.

Parents of children killed have brought several legal actions under various legal theories. One of the successful suits was against the shooter’s mother’s estate. Since she was also killed in the rampage, her estate was liable for injuries resulting from her negligent acts that contributed to the killing. The plaintiff’s claimed she negligently kept a Bushmaster AR-15 unsecured, allowing her troubled son access to the weapon. The parties settled for $1.5 million to be divided among the plaintiffs.

One family brought suit against the town and school district, alleging the school was unprepared and the response was insufficient. The trial court dismissed the case in 2018, ruling that the situation was so unexpected, intense, and wildly dangerous that hindsight regarding safety protocols could not be deemed negligent.

May 28, 2019

Court Decides Whether 30-Day Notice Must Be Given to Private Companies Responsible for Massachusetts Road Defects

by Neumann Law Group

Photocredit: terekhov igor / Shutterstock.com

In a recent case before Massachusetts’s Supreme Judicial Court, the court was asked to clarify under what circumstances an injury victim was required to provide 30-day notice in cases involving road defects. In that case, the plaintiff was injured when he was riding his bike and hit a utility cover that was not completely aligned with the road. The plaintiff filed a negligence claim against the city, but the city claimed that an energy company was responsible for the misaligned cover. The plaintiff then brought a negligence claim against the energy company. However, a judge dismissed the plaintiff’s case for failure to provide notice to the company within thirty days of the plaintiff’s injury, as required by statute. The plaintiff appealed.

Under M. G. L. c. 84, § 15 of the Tort Claims Act, the statute generally imposes liability on the county, city, town or “person by law obliged to repair the same” for injuries caused by a defect “in or upon a way.” If a person’s claim falls under § 15, the plaintiff is required to give notice before bringing a claim. Under § 18, a person must provide notice within thirty days of the injury to the county, city, town or “person by law obliged to keep said way in repair.”

February 13, 2019

Massachusetts Appeals Court Declines to Apply Exception to 30-Day Notice Requirement in Recent Slip-and-Fall Case

by Neumann Law Group

Photo Credit: riopatuca / Shutterstock.com

Some laws can lead to harsh results, but when courts apply these laws they generally do so because of an honestly held belief that they are enforcing the law exactly as it is written. In a recent slip-and-fall case before a Massachusetts appeals court, the court dismissed the claim even though the plaintiff claimed she could not have known who the responsible party was within the allotted time.

The Facts of the Case

According to the court’s opinion, the plaintiff stepped on an uneven depression in a road in Boston and seriously injured her left foot. She notified the city of her claim within thirty days, and almost three months later, the city denied liability and claimed the Boston Gas Company was the responsible party. The plaintiff sent notice to Boston Gas the next day, and later filed a complaint against the city and the gas company.

Evidently, Boston Gas moved to dismiss the claim, arguing that the plaintiff failed to timely file notice of the claim. In this case, it was undisputed that the plaintiff did not notify the gas company within thirty days. However, the plaintiff argued that her failure to comply with the notice requirement was excusable because it was “virtually impossible” to know that the gas company was the responsible party within the thirty-day period.

June 11, 2018

Massachusetts Court Rules School Cannot Be Held Liable for Bullying Injuries

by Neumann Law Group

Unfortunately, bullying happens in schools all over Massachusetts every day. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court issued a ruling earlier this year that clarifies who can be sued when a student suffers physical injuries from bullying. In the case at issue, an elementary school student was pushed down the stairs by a classmate in an act of bullying. The court affirmed a motion to dismiss after a lawsuit was brought against Lynn Public Schools, the school district in Massachusetts where the bullying occurred. The court held that the Massachusetts Tort Claims Act bars this case from going forward and essentially shields the district from liability for this and similar incidents. This does not necessarily mean the family of the injured student has no civil recourse; there may still be other people who could be held responsible for his injuries. Knowing who should be sued can be complicated due to laws like the Tort Claims Act and similar legislation. That’s why it’s so important to contact a skilled Massachusetts personal injury attorney if you are injured. If you don’t include all of the necessary parties, you may lose your chance to hold them accountable.

The Massachusetts Tort Claims Act

The Massachusetts Tort Claims Act specifies that public employers are liable for negligent or wrongful acts when they are committed by employees acting within the scope of their employment. However, the act includes an exception to liability when the violent or tortious act was committed by a third party, unless the employee was the original cause of the situation.

November 13, 2017

Appeals Court Holds Bicycle Collision Case Barred by the Massachusetts Torts Claims Act

by Neumann Law Group

A recent case arose from a bicycle collision on the Cape Cod Rail Trail between a child on a supervised school field trip and a passing cyclist. The injured cyclist and his wife appealed from a Superior Court judgment entered on the defendants’ motion for summary judgment, dismissing their negligence claims against the town of Williamstown and others. On appeal, the plaintiffs contended that (1) the chaperones who supervised the field trip were not public employees and thus could be held personally liable for their negligence, and (2) the Massachusetts Tort Claims Act (MTCA) did not preclude their claims against the town. The Massachusetts Appeals Court affirmed the lower court’s judgment for the defendants in this Massachusetts bicycle accident case.The plaintiffs argued that the lower court erred when it concluded that the chaperones supervising the elementary school field trip were public employees as a matter of law. They suggested that the chaperones were independent contractors who had broad discretion in exercising their duties and therefore should not be afforded the liability protections provided by the MTCA.

The test for determining whether an individual is a public employee, the appeals court explained, is the same as that used to establish whether an agent is a servant for whose negligent acts a principal may be liable under the common law doctrine of respondeat superior. The basic question is whether a person is subject to the direction and control of a public employer.

The appeals court explained that even if it were to draw all of the inferences in a manner favorable to the plaintiffs, the undisputed facts showed that the principal and the teachers retained the right of control and that the chaperones were subject to their direction and control as a matter of law. Before the field trip, the school held a chaperone meeting in which the chaperones were given guidelines for their duties on the trip. The guidelines stated that the teacher was in charge, and their directions must be followed at all times. The guidelines also instructed the chaperones to follow all safety rules, not leave children alone or unescorted, and keep the groups together.

July 17, 2017

Massachusetts Appeals Court Holds Police Not Immunized From Liability for Canine Attack

by Neumann Law Group

A plaintiff filed suit for negligence under the Massachusetts Tort Claims Act (Act) against the Massachusetts State Police after being attacked by a trained police dog in a parking lot. A state trooper who was an experienced dog handler had been in pursuit of a criminal through that parking lot. The plaintiff sued the police, alleging that the trooper’s conduct in releasing the police dog to capture a criminal in a public space created a foreseeable risk of harm to an innocent bystander. The lower court disagreed and granted summary judgment to the state police, reasoning that the plaintiff’s negligence claim was barred by the immunity provisions of the Act. The plaintiff appealed.In reversing, the appeals court first explained that the Act exempts a public employer from liability for any claim based on the performance of a discretionary duty by a public employee, regardless of whether that discretion is abused. The parties agreed that the state police was a public employer immunized from liability by the discretionary function exemption in the Act.