This case involves a low-impact, rear-end car collision. Plaintiff appeals from a jury verdict finding that defendant’s conceded breach of a duty of care, and the resulting auto accident, was not the proximate cause of any injuries and harm to plaintiff. We conclude that the trial court’s instruction concerning proximate cause improperly and prejudicially directed the jury to consider the foreseeability of plaintiff’s injuries, even though “duty” and “breach” had been established as a matter of law, and we reverse.
The court included the following paragraph at the end of the proximate cause instruction:
“The exact occurrence, or the precise injuries and damage which result need not have been actually anticipated; a person may be held liable for the results of her own negligent conduct if those consequences can be fairly regarded as normal incidents of the risk created by the circumstances. However, injury of the type or kind which did occur as a result of negligent conduct must have been not merely possible, but reasonably foreseeable.”
What makes this instruction problematic, is the court’s linkage of “foreseeability” to the concept of proximate cause, particularly where the defendant’s breach of a legal duty to plaintiff was established as a matter of law and the only issues left to the jury were causation and damages. The foreseeability of the consequences of a defendant’s actions is relevant only to the question of whether the defendant had and breached a legal duty to the plaintiff.
It has been so long settled in this jurisdiction that proximate cause relates only to cause-in-fact, with no foreseeability required, that extended discussion is unnecessary. Although relevant to the determination of duty and breach, foreseeability “is not a factor in determining proximate cause. A defendant who has breached a legal duty to a plaintiff is liable for all the injurious consequences that flow from the negligence until diverted by the intervention of some efficient cause that makes the injury its own, or until the force set in motion by the negligent act has so far spent itself as to be too small for the law’s notice.
In this case, rather than clearly instructing the jury that defendant was liable for all injurious consequences that flowed from her admitted breach of a duty to plaintiff, the trial court expressly directed the jury to consider the foreseeability of the type of injury plaintiff alleged as an element of proximate cause, even though duty and breach had been established as a matter of law by the court and the jury had been so instructed.
Defendant’s closing argument, in addition to directly refering to the instruction on foreseeability, reiterated the notion that “this kind of event doesn’t cause injury.” In light of the court’s instruction concerning foreseeability and defendant’s focus on that instruction in closing, the jury could easily have concluded that plaintiff was not entitled to recover for her ongoing injuries, even if they were caused by defendant’s actions, because the kind of injuries she suffered was not foreseeable. Thus, we find the instruction was prejudicial.
“The exact occurrence, or the precise injuries and damage which result need not have been actually anticipated; a person may be held liable for the results of her own negligent conduct if those consequences can be fairly regarded as normal incidents of the risk created by the circumstances. However, injury of the type or kind which did occur as a result of negligent conduct must have been not merely possible, but reasonably foreseeable.”
What makes this instruction problematic, is the court’s linkage of “foreseeability” to the concept of proximate cause, particularly where the defendant’s breach of a legal duty to plaintiff was established as a matter of law and the only issues left to the jury were causation and damages. The foreseeability of the consequences of a defendant’s actions is relevant only to the question of whether the defendant had and breached a legal duty to the plaintiff.
It has been so long settled in this jurisdiction that proximate cause relates only to cause-in-fact, with no foreseeability required, that extended discussion is unnecessary. Although relevant to the determination of duty and breach, foreseeability “is not a factor in determining proximate cause. A defendant who has breached a legal duty to a plaintiff is liable for all the injurious consequences that flow from the negligence until diverted by the intervention of some efficient cause that makes the injury its own, or until the force set in motion by the negligent act has so far spent itself as to be too small for the law’s notice.
In this case, rather than clearly instructing the jury that defendant was liable for all injurious consequences that flowed from her admitted breach of a duty to plaintiff, the trial court expressly directed the jury to consider the foreseeability of the type of injury plaintiff alleged as an element of proximate cause, even though duty and breach had been established as a matter of law by the court and the jury had been so instructed.
Defendant’s closing argument, in addition to directly refering to the instruction on foreseeability, reiterated the notion that “this kind of event doesn’t cause injury.” In light of the court’s instruction concerning foreseeability and defendant’s focus on that instruction in closing, the jury could easily have concluded that plaintiff was not entitled to recover for her ongoing injuries, even if they were caused by defendant’s actions, because the kind of injuries she suffered was not foreseeable. Thus, we find the instruction was prejudicial.
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