RUNNING HEAD: Tort and Liability

Tort and Liability

Isabella Henkel

College of Southern Nevada

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In the case of Ray Knight, a school’s lack of communication resulted in the injury of a

middle school student off of school grounds. Knight was suspended from the school as a result of

unexcused absences, but the procedure for notifying parents of his suspension was not followed.

Knight was given only a written notice and no phone call was made to his parents, which led to

the notice being thrown away. Due to this, Knight’s parents did not know that their son was

suspended, and their son was injured during his suspension when he was spending time at a

friend’s house. In this case, should the school be held liable for Knight’s injuries, or do his

parents have no grounds to sue for liability?

In Vaughan v Menlove (1837) 132 ER 490, a man built a haystack that subsequently

caught on fire and spread said fire to the nearby plantiff’s land. Before this, the man was told

several times that his haystack was considered dangerous, but he had decided to keep stacking

hay the same way despite this. The man was seen as liable for not complying with warnings and

standards for haystacking. Knight’s parents could sue the school in this case as the school did not

comply with their own set standards and rules for notifying parents of suspension, thus resulting

in their son’s injury.

In Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad Co., 248 N.Y. 339, 162 N.E. 99, a woman had sued

Long Island Rail Road Station for injuries caused to her due to an incident at the station. Two

men attempted to board the train before hers alongside employees, and they had dropped a

package that exploded and further caused an object to hit her. Despite having suffered long-term

injury such as a stammer, it was decided by the court that the employees, men, and rail road

station would not be held responsible due to the fact that her injury was not something that was

foreseeable. So in the case of Knight’s injury, the school would not be seen as legible as
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Knight’s injury could not have been foreseen by staff in the case of his parents not receiving a

call to notify them of his three-day suspension.

In Hoyem v. Manhattan Beach City Sch. Dist. (1978) 22 Cal.3d 508, a similar case where

a student had been injured off of school grounds during school hours. In this case, the school was

not seen as negligent in the case of the student who was injured due to leaving the school during

school hours. It was argued that even though there was cases that make the school take

responsibility in the scenario that a student is injured off-campus due to a school’s inability to

provide reasonable care, this was not seen as one of those cases. This argues against the idea that

Knight’s parents could sue the school for negligence due to the incident happening off campus

and the school having provided care

From the cases provided, I conclude that in this case, the school is not negligent in

Knight’s injury and should not be held responsible or sued by his parents. Referencing Palsgraf

v. Long Island Railroad Co., 248 N.Y. 339, 162 N.E. 99, Knight’s injury was not a foreseeable

cause of the school not contacting his parents to notify them of his suspension, and as a result,

they are not responsible.

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References

(n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.courts.state.ny.us/reporter/archives/palsgraf_lirr.htm

H2O. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://h2o.law.harvard.edu/collages/4855

Hoyem v. Manhattan Beach City Sch. Dist. (n.d.). Retrieved from

https://law.justia.com/cases/california/supreme-court/3d/22/508.html