Deep Duty: The Court of Appeals' Recent Decision in 'Ferreira v. City of Binghamton' and the Morass of the Special Duty Rule
In 'Ferreira v. City of Binghamton', the Court of Appeals addressed the applicability of the special duty rule to a case brought by a person shot by police during a no-knock entry of a residence. Even though all seven judges agreed that the plaintiff should be allowed to recover, the case produced two sharply divided opinions and augured further such divisions in future cases.
May 23, 2022 at 12:00 PM
15 minute read
The "special duty" rule is perhaps one of the thorniest and most confusing areas of tort law. It requires that a municipality, when performing a governmental function, be found to have owed a duty to the injured party greater than whatever obligation it may have had to the public at large in order to be held liable. For example, a person cannot sue a police department purely for failing to protect him from harm by a third party. But, if the police make a specific promise to protect a person, who relies on that promise to his detriment, and they then fail to deliver on it, the municipality may be found to have accepted a special duty and be held liable. See, e.g., Cuffy v. City of New York, 69 N.Y.2d 255 (1987).
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