Hannah Nashed: The Good Samaritan Laws
The man lay still on the pavement, a soaked shirt and pair of shorts clinging tightly to his stiff form. His skin was cold and pale —his heart had stopped. John had been on a run when he saw the man fall off his paddleboard. It had taken John 2 minutes to realize that the man was in danger and 4 minutes to pull him out of the water. Now, John had two choices: attempt CPR or wait for the ambulance. In just 6 minutes, the stranger in front of him would die, while the ambulance would take at least 10. There was no other choice. John tilted the man’s head back, laced his fingers together, and pushed hard in the middle of the man’s chest.
The stranger woke up the next day in the hospital, alive but with several broken ribs as a consequence of John’s attempted CPR. The man tried to press legal charges, but John was protected under the Good Samaritan Law.
The Good Samaritan Laws protect individuals who provide emergency assistance when encountering someone in need (“Good Samaritan Laws”). The name of such laws finds its origin in a parable from the New Testament where a Samaritan man stops on the road to aid a man who had been beaten by robbers. In 1959, California became the first state to pass a Good Samaritan Law, and as of 2023, every state as well as the District of Columbia currently has enacted some form of Good Samaritan legislation (DeGuerre). Though the explicit language of the law differs from state to state, in general, it “protects people from civil liability for injuries when an attempt has been made to aid someone needing medical attention” (Niemi). The law implies a duty to assist —encouraging individuals to provide help to those in need without having to first weigh the fear of potential liability, which might otherwise deter them from providing care. However, the law does not provide blanket immunity. In order for the Good Samaritan law to be a viable defense, three conditions must be met: care must have been administered during an emergency situation; the volunteer must not be responsible for causing the emergency; and care must not have been given in a grossly negligent manner (“Good Samaritan Laws”). Though the second stipulation is relatively self-explanatory, the first and third are comprised of loose syntax that can be interpreted in various ways. The structure of such stipulations yields often contradictory outcomes and strictly limits the scope of the Good Samaritan Law to a specific subset of people.
A medical emergency, though seemingly definitive in everyday life, is a rather ambiguous term in regard to the legal realm. In the case of Anderson v Little & Davenport Funeral Home, Inc., a “medical emergency” was defined as “the performance of necessary personal services during an unforeseen circumstance that calls for immediate action” (“Anderson V. Little &C. Funeral Home”). It’s important to note that this definition does not specify that the person receiving care must be in critical or life-threatening condition. However, some courts do interpret such language as implying that the care in question must be of a medical nature —a stipulation that resulted in Lisa Torti being sued after attempting to rescue her friend.
On December 19th, 2008 Lisa Torti was found liable by the Supreme Court of California in a 4-3 decision as a result of her efforts to pull her friend, Alexandra Van Horn, out of a car crash. The two had been drinking and smoking marijuana at a bar before eventually leaving in separate cars. Soon after they departed, Van Horn crashed into a pole at which point Torti jumped out of her car to help. Convinced that the car her friend was trapped in was on the verge of catching fire, Torti attempted to pull Van Horn out. While doing so, Torti accidentally “exacerbated the back injuries the accident had caused” resulting in Van Horn’s permanent paralysis (Sebok). The case was initially dismissed during trial on the grounds of the Good Samaritan law —the trial judge agreed that in accordance with the statute, Torti had “rendered care in an emergency” and therefore was immune to any charges brought against her (Sebok). However, the case then went to the California Supreme Court which ruled that the Good Samaritan law was not applicable in this case due to the fact that the state’s Good Samaritan law “implicitly referred to emergency medical care, not all emergency care” (Sebok). Rescuing Van Horn from a car in this case was not deemed to be a form of emergency medical care. The decision faced significant criticism from both the general public as well as other Justices seated on the California Supreme Court. They argued that this ruling essentially created a situation where any non-medical rescue attempts might expose an individual to liability charges, whereas a medical rescue, even if unsuccessful, would shield an individual from legal repercussions under the Good Samaritan law. Such a strict interpretation of the law however is not necessarily standard procedure.
An opposite ruling can be seen in the case of Carter v Reese, where the Twelfth District Court of Appeals in Ohio ruled in a 2-1 decision that even though the volunteer did not administer medical emergency care, he was still protected by the Good Samaritan statute. In April 2012, truck driver Dennis Carter ended up with his leg stuck between the trailer of his tractor and the dock. Hearing Carter’s screams for help, Larry Reese Jr came from across the street and attempted to move the truck forward to release Carter. However, Reese accidentally put the car in reverse, resulting in Carter’s ultimate amputation. Despite protests that the care administered was not medical, the case was ultimately dismissed on the grounds that Reese’s actions were protected by the Good Samaritan law. This case is in direct contradiction to Torti v Van Horn where the “emergency care” stipulation in the Good Samaritan law was interpreted as only applying to emergency medical care. These different outcomes can, in turn, be attributed to individual judges’ various convictions regarding the implications of legislation. In the case of Carter v Reese, Judge Hendrickson, found that when “construing a statute, a court may not add or delete words [...] Therefore we hold that the Good Samaritan statute in R.C. 23025.23 applies to any person, health care professional or otherwise, who administers ‘emergency care,’ medical or otherwise” (Trevas). These two contrasting examples alone are representative of the legal ambiguity associated with the Good Samaritan law. Unfortunately, such vague word choice and lack of syntactical specificity are not restrained to the first condition of the law but rather imbued throughout.
The third stipulation of the Good Samaritan law is that the help administered is not done so in a “grossly negligent manner.” “Negligent” in this regard is “generally thought to be actions that do not [meet] the standard of reasonable behavior. For example, negligence would exist in a Good Samaritan situation where it could be shown that the Good Samaritan knew, or should have known, that their intervention would injure the person they were trying to help” (“Good Samaritan Laws”). It is important to note the specification of “gross negligence” as opposed to negligence. This distinction implies a thin yet significant difference between “gross negligence” and “ordinary negligence.” Though both “involve a failure of personal responsibility that directly causes injury or harm,” gross negligence has an added requirement of potential intent (DeCastroverde). If the person providing aid harms the individual in a way that can be interpreted as deliberate and or reckless, they would have acted with gross negligence and thus would not be protected under the Good Samaritan laws.
As it has thus far been discussed, the Good Samaritan law is primarily used as a defense for laymen providing aid to fellow civilians. However, the Good Samaritan law can also apply to those in the medical profession under additional specifications. Firstly, the care must be provided freely with no expectation of remuneration of any sort. Secondly, the physician “must not have a pre-existing duty to provide care to the patient” — such duties would include “if the victim is a current patient, [if] the physician is contractually obligated to provide care to the victim, or [if] there is an on-call agreement that requires the physician to provide service” (Dachs and Elias). Due to these requirements Good Samaritan laws typically only apply to medical professionals outside of their place of work; however, like everything, there are exceptions.
In the case of McIntyre v Ramirez, Dr. McIntyre was protected under the Good Samaritan law after the emergency delivery of an infant resulted in various birth defects. On April 23, 1998, Debra Ramirez was scheduled to have her labor induced under the care of Dr. Patricia Gunter. However, Dr. Gunter was not readily available when the baby’s head began to crown and a nurse sent out a page for “Dr. Stork” —a page signaling “that a delivery is in progress without a doctor present and that a doctor is needed immediately” (“McIntyre v. Ramirez (2003)”). Dr. McIntyre was not on call but responded to the page. As a result of several birthing complications, the baby was born with “permanent neurological impairment and paralysis of his right upper extremity and shoulder girdle” (“McIntyre v. Ramirez (2003)”). Ramirez ended up suing both Dr. McIntrye and Dr. Gunter, who eventually came later to help with the birth. Dr. McIntrye ultimately moved for summary judgment based on the Good Samaritan law. Dr. McIntrye had no prior duty to provide care for Ramirez as he was not her doctor and was also not on call for her doctor. Additionally, Dr. McIntyre undisputedly claimed that no doctor in his position would have ever expected remuneration for providing aid in such a situation. Therefore, even though he holds the title of a doctor and his actions took place within a hospital, Dr. McIntyre, having no pre-existing obligation to Ramirez and anticipating no compensation for his actions, was shielded by the Good Samaritan statute.
It’s clear that despite its stipulations, the Good Samaritan Law has numerous applications and subtle nuances that are interpreted differently across both states and courts. Nevertheless, throughout its various interpretations, one thing remains clear: those with medical knowledge are held to a higher standard. This causes an issue in the sense that “when the opportunity to be a Good Samaritan presents itself, ethical considerations weigh as heavily on many physicians as legal ones” (Dachs and Elias). In fact, research shows that the majority of residents and fellows were reluctant to help in emergency situations due to potential liability concerns (West and Varacallo). This reluctance can in turn foster somewhat of a bystander effect where individuals simply expect or hope that others will assist – removing the risk of potential negative consequences for themselves. Though laws exist that protect medical professionals outside a clinical setting, they aren’t firmly cemented and are also not common knowledge amongst physicians. Additionally, the laws protecting physicians responding to an emergency setting within a clinical setting are essentially non-existent.
In general, the Good Samaritan law does not apply to doctors taking care of their own patients. This is a seemingly uncontroversial aspect of the Good Samaritan Law. Doctors are seen as providers of health and insurers of well-being. Such individuals studied and practiced to save lives and thus any failure to meet such expectations opens them up to liability. However, what this fails to take into account is the state of emergency that doctors are consequently confronted with. With limited time, limited resources, and only themselves to rely upon, doctors are expected to succeed every time. In any other job, such an expectation would be considered unreasonable, but because of the nature of medicine and the life-and-death consequences of the profession, doctors are granted no leeway. Thus though doctors may respond to the fullest of their capabilities, without negligence or mal-intent, to an emergent situation with no clear solution, any negative outcome is still subject to potential legal scrutiny. Though such logic may ring fair for the patients, for the physician, the possibility of future legal repercussions becomes yet another factor they must weigh.
This is not to denounce medical malpractice as a whole, but rather simply aims to raise the idea of extending the Good Samaritan Law to doctors within the hospital bounds to a reasonable extent. This would not grant immunity to doctors who act with negligence or medical incompetence from being sued but rather concretely put protections in place to shield doctors acting in emergency situations under the same circumstances posed by the Good Samaritan Law. In the case of McIntyre v Ramirez, Dr. McIntyre was protected by the Good Samaritan Law under the mercy of an individual judge. Had the Doctor been in a different court, the legislation might have been interpreted differently and the verdict might have been guilty. His fate, along with any other doctors, is not definitively protected. As such, an official and indisputable extension of Good Samaritan legislation could alleviate doctors' reluctance in responding to emergency situations, and offer them peace of mind. This in turn would enable medical professionals to focus solely on patient care without having to simultaneously balance concern about potential legal ramifications.
Hannah Nashed is a Sophomore at Yale University in Berkeley College
Citations:
“Anderson V. Little &C. Funeral Home.” Justia Law, law.justia.com/cases/georgia/ supreme-court/1978/33896-1.html. Accessed 26 Nov. 2023.
Dachs, Robert J., and Jay M. Elias. “What You Need to Know When Called Upon to Be a Good Samaritan.” Family Practice Management, 31 Mar. 2008, www.aafp.org/pubs/fpm/ issues/2008/0400/p37.html.
DeCastroverde, Alex. “What Is the Difference Between Negligence and Gross Negligence?” DeCastroverde Law Group - Accident & Injury, DeCastroverde Law, 28 Apr. 2022, www.dlgteam.com/blog/what-is-the-difference-between-negligence-and-gross-negligence.
DeGuerre, Cameron. “Good Samaritan Statutes: Are Medical Volunteers Protected?” Journal of Ethics | American Medical Association, American Medical Association, 1 Apr. 2004, journalofethics.ama-assn.org/article/good-samaritan-statutes-are-medical-volunteers-protected/2004-04#:~:text=Thus%2C%20the%20purpose%20underlying%20Good,of%20the%20states%20eventually%20followed.
“Good Samaritan Laws.” Gilman & Bedigian, LLC, 19 Feb. 2021, www.gilmanbedigian.com/good-samaritan-laws/.
“McIntyre v. Ramirez (2003)”, FindLaw, caselaw.findlaw.com/court/tx-supreme-court/1111091.html. Accessed 26 Nov. 2023.
Niemi, Daren. “Good Samaritan Laws.” Good Samaritan Laws | Sweeney Law Firm, sweeneylawfirm.com/content/good-samaritan-laws#:~:text=Monetary%20compensation%20often%20makes%20void,the%20right%20to%20refuse%20treatment. Accessed 26 Nov. 2023.
Sebok, Anthony J. The California Supreme Court Holds That Good Samaritans Providing Nonmedical Aid Can Be Held Liable If They Act Negligently, FindLaw, 13 Jan. 2009, supreme.findlaw.com/legal-commentary/the-california-supreme-court-holds-that-good-samaritans-providing-nonmedical-aid-can-be-held-liable-if-they-act-negligently.html.
Trevas, Dan. “Twelfth District: Law Blocks Amputee from Suing Good Samaritan.” Court News Ohio, 17 Dec. 2014, www.courtnewsohio.gov/cases/2014/COA/1217/2014-ohio-5395.asp.
West, Brain, and Matthew Varacallo. “Good Samaritan Laws .” National Library of Medicine: National Center for Biotechnology Information, 12 Sept. 2022, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK542176/.
