STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLANT,
v.
JERAMY R. RUSHING, APPELLEE
AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.
Florida reverses a trial court's dismissal of a manslaughter charge, holding that a victim's suicide can constitute a foreseeable intervening cause when the defendant placed a loaded gun in the victim's hands after she expressed suicidal intent. The court rejected the defendant's argument that the victim's independent act of pulling the trigger was an unforeseeable superceding cause that insulated him from liability.
The court held that if an intervening cause is foreseeable, it cannot insulate a defendant from liability. As a matter of law, the victim's suicide was not unforeseeable under these facts because she had explicitly announced her suicidal intent immediately before the defendant provided her a loaded weapon. Therefore, the question of foreseeability is for the jury, not to be decided by the trial court as a matter of law.
[1] Summary judgment is reviewed de novo, with all possible inferences drawn in favor of the party against whom summary judgment is sought.
[2] Movants for summary judgment in a negligence case face an especially high burden.
Previewing 2 of 6 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“If an intervening cause is foreseeable, it cannot insulate a defendant from all liability.”
Establishes the key legal principle that foreseeability of an intervening cause defeats the defense of superceding cause.
Previewing 1 of 3 key quotes on this case — the court’s exact language, pinpointed for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceThe defendant and victim were talking in a bar when the victim expressed unhappiness, depression, and a desire to 'blow her brains out.' The defendant…
The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.
Explore caselaw by topic → Browse Foreseeability Of Intervening Cause cases and more on FLexlaw
LETTS, Judge.
The trial court dismissed the information, which charged the defendant with manslaughter by culpable negligence, because the court was of the opinion that a “su-perceding intervening act” was the cause of death. We reverse.
The defendant and the deceased victim were talking in a bar, the latter evincing unhappiness, depression, and a desire to “blow her brains out.” Obligingly, the defendant took the victim out to the parking lot and gave her a .45 caliber pistol produced from his automobile. As described in part in the defendant’s own words:
We went out to the car and I opened the door and I took the gun out ... I held it up like this here. And so I didn’t want her thinking this was just a toy or something or I would — to be — I wanted to make sure she was careful. So I chambered a round like this here. And I held the gun up like this and I said, “Now this is a real gun and it’s loaded.” I didn’t want her to think this was, you know, some toy she could play with. You know, and I wanted — I guess I wanted to scare her a little bit at the same time. And when I did that then she reached out and took the gun.
And she had walked to the other side of the parking lot. And as I was walking up to her she turned around. She looked at me. And she said something. I don’t even know what she said. And then she pulled the gun up to her head and pulled the trigger. In granting the motion to dismiss, the trial court conceded, for the purposes of the motion, that the defendant was culpably negligent. Nevertheless, the trial court opined that, as a matter of law, there occurred a “superceding intervening act of the alleged victim ... in that her death was caused by her own independent act of suicide.”
The defendant relies heavily on J.A.C. v. State, 374 So. 2d 606 (Fla. 3d DCA 1979), cert. denied, 383 So. 2d 1203 (Fla.1980), for the proposition that the victim’s act of pulling the trigger was an intervening, su-perceding cause. In J.A.C., the decedent was a passenger in a car involved in a drag race. “The accident occurred only because the decedent, while attempting to operate the gear shift, instead grabbed the steering wheel and caused the vehicle to go out of control.” Id. at 607. Under the circumstances, the court in J.A. C. found the conduct of the defendant was not the proximate cause of the homicide since its effect was superceded by the decedent’s own independent intervening act.
The present case would appear to be distinguishable. If an intervening cause is foreseeable, it cannot insulate a defendant from all liability. Rupp v. Bryant, 417 So. 2d 658 (Fla.1982). In Loranger v. State Department of Transportation, 448 So. 2d 1036, 1037 (Fla. 4th DCA 1983), this court quoted Cole v. Leach, 405 So. 2d 449, 450 (Fla. 4th DCA 1981):
One whose negligence causes injury to another is liable for all of the consequences that naturally and proximately flow from such injury, Cone v. Intercounty Telephone and Telegraph Company, 40 So. 2d 148 (Fla.1949), including injury from an intervening cause when such intervening cause is itself a reasonably foreseeable consequence of the tortfeasor’s conduct, Gibson v. Avis Rent-A-Car Systems, Inc., 386 So. 2d 520 (Fla. 1980), the question of whether the intervening cause was reasonably foreseeable being one for the trier of fact. Gibson v. Avis Rent-A-Car Systems, Inc., supra.
See also Padgett v. West Florida Electrical Cooperative, Inc., 417 So. 2d 764, 768 (Fla. 1st DCA 1982).
In the case at bar, we are of the firm opinion that it cannot be said as a matter of law that the deceased victim’s actions were not foreseeable. See State v. Marti, 290 N.W. 2d 570 (Iowa 1980); Persampieri v. Commonwealth, 343 Mass. 19, 175 N.E. 2d 387 (1961); State v. Bier, 181 Mont. 27, 591 P. 2d 1115 (1979).
The victim had said she wanted to blow her brains out. The defendant immediately furnished her with a loaded pistol and stood and watched her do just that. The defendant, of course, claims that he thought the victim was joking, but as a matter of law it cannot be said that it was unforeseeable that the victim would do that very thing which she had already announced she would. As a consequence, under the facts sub judice, the question of foreseeability is for the jury.
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
HERSEY, C.J., and WALDEN, J., concur.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Cited By
-
Howell v. State, 877 So. 2d 697 (Fla. 2004)…t asserts nonetheless that had trial counsel introduced the evidence and requested an instruction thereon, the jury might have returned a verdict other than guilty of first-degree murder. In support of this contention, Howell cites State v. Rushing, 532 So. 2d 1338 (Fla. 4th DCA 1988), in which the court reversed the dismissal of an information charging manslaughter by culpable negligence based on the defendant’s act of giving a loaded gun to the suicidal victim. The court concluded in Rushing that because “-a…
-
Glover v. Glover, 601 So. 2d 231 (Fla. 1st DCA 1992)…1st DCA 1987). Although the decision whether to require Husband to maintain a life insurance policy listing the four children as beneficiaries is discretionary with the trial court, see Bosem v. Bosem, 279 So. 2d 863 (Fla.1973); Abolsky v. Abolsky, 532 So. 2d 1338 (Fla. 3d DCA 1988), the failure to address and determine the life insurance issue raised at trial by Wife’s pleadings and testimony is an error of omission, and the issue of life insurance must be considered as part of the overall equitable distribu…
-
Jeramy James Rickey Rushing v. State, 568 So. 2d 1279 (Fla. 4th DCA 1990)…ening suicide, removed a pistol from his automobile and loaded it in front of the victim. The victim then received or took the gun from the defendant and shot herself. This court has previously addressed the merits of the charge in State v. Rushing, 532 So. 2d 1338 (Fla. 4th DCA 1988). Appellant requested the following abbreviated excusable homicide instruction: The killing of a human being is excusable, and therefore lawful, when commit [*1280] ted by accident and misfortune in doing any lawful act by lawfu…
Authorities Cited
- Gibson v. AVIS Rent-A-Car Sys., Inc., 386 So. 2d 520 (Fla. 1980)
- Rupp v. Bryant, 417 So. 2d 658 (Fla. 1982)
- Cone v. Inter Cnty. Tel. Tel. Co., 40 So.2d 148 (Fla. 1949)
- Loranger v. State, 448 So. 2d 1036 (Fla. 4th DCA 1983)
- Padgett v. W. Fla. Elec. Coop., Inc., 417 So. 2d 764 (Fla. 1st DCA 1982)
- Douglas Slavin, M.D. v. Univ. OF Miami, Inc., 374 So. 2d 606 (Fla. 3d DCA 1979)
- Cole v. Morley Allen Leach & S.C. Ins., 405 So. 2d 449 (Fla. 4th DCA 1981)