Seinfeld's Good Samaritan Law Now Reality? 735
e3m4n writes "The fictitious 'good samaritan' law from the final episode of Seinfeld (the one that landed them in jail for a year) appears to be headed toward reality for California residents after the house passed this bill. There are some differences, such as direct action is not required, but the concept of guilt by association for not doing the right thing is still on the face of the bill."
No (Score:5, Informative)
Did the submitter do their research at all? (Score:5, Informative)
NOT ficticious (Score:2, Informative)
That famous Seinfeld ending was based on a very law recently passed at that time in Massachusetts. The episode was set in Latham,MA. The law referenced was not fictitious. Similar laws exist in many places.
Re:When girls can be raped in public with no 911 c (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Did the submitter do their research at all? (Score:3, Informative)
"Good Samaritan" laws in the sense of Seinfeld already exist in many jurisdictions. It is called a "duty to rescue" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duty_to_rescue [wikipedia.org].
"A duty to rescue is a concept in tort law..."
Civil law, not criminal.
Is-ought problem (Score:5, Informative)
Just because it is the case that the bystander effect is normal doesn't mean it ought to be the case that it is normal. This is a very common logical fallacy in moral philosophy called the is-ought problem [wikipedia.org] as it was well articulated by David Hume. The gist of it is that you cannot take descriptive statements as premises and come to a prescriptive conclusion.
The reason why there are such laws is because we feel that we should have a moral responsibility to help those who are in immediate life-threatening danger when we are in a position to help them without (too much) personal sacrifice.
Re:A bit late? (Score:3, Informative)
In California, presence of training does not obligate helping. However, once one does begin to intercede, that person cannot stop helping until relieved by emergency personnel. (At least this is how two first aid trainers have explained it to me.)
The need for revision to California's Good Samaritan law comes as a result of a successful lawsuit against a woman who pulled another woman out of a wrecked car, and in doing so, managed to paralyze the victim. The rescuer is generally agreed to have over-reacted, but was acting with good intention. The court ruled narrowly in that case, but by the letter of the law, it ruled correctly. However, the precedent was set.
BTW, it was the California Assembly that passed the bill. California does not have a portion of the legislature called the House. The Assembly basically fills that role, however.
Re:Politician's "thinking" (Score:3, Informative)
Uh, it is quite possible to arrest and convict people for rape, and it is quite possible to detain illegal immigrants and deport them, possibly after criminal charges and penalties. What fantasy world are you talking about?
Re:A bit late? (Score:4, Informative)
Uhm, what do you think governments are for then?
1) Defend the borders & provide for basic public saftey.
2) Deliver the mail
3) Build the roads
4) _Maybe_ provide public education
5) Collect enough tax renevue to do ONLY the above.
And thats it.
Re:Politician's "thinking" (Score:3, Informative)
Re:A bit late? (Score:3, Informative)
In Australia we have a shield law for good samaritans. There are three caveats required to invoke the shield law:
1. You must be acting reasonably (although this is to be interpreted in the favor of the good samaritan if in doubt).
2. You must not act without permission, although you may assume you have permission if the victim is unable to give it.
3. You must not be performing something for which you are professionally trained and the act you are seeking shielding from is something for which you could be held liable for under that training (eg. doctor committing mal-practice).
The first test came when a good samaritan ripped a lady's top off to be able to perform CPR (she had had a heart attack and collapsed on the street, and her bra was impeding his effort). She sued him for exposing her in public, and the shield law meant the case couldn't even be heard. IANAL but I understand from my first aid instructor that you are legally shielded against all possible consequences; criminal, civil, procedural, and anything else you can think of.
I understand we also have specific crimes along the lines of "Indifference" and "Aggravated Indifference" which mean you can be held criminally liable for not helping, but a paramedic I know tells me that this is based on your level of training: an average person is expected to call 000 (our 911 equivalent), while a doctor is expected to stop and lend full medical assistance, and a soldier would be expected to intervene physically if the odds meant his own safety wouldn't be compromised. He (the paramedic) said that he was unofficially instructed to GTFO if he ever witnesses an accident, because legally he MUST stop and render medical assistance, but he could be held liable for screwing up first aid and his professional indemnity insurance wouldn't cover him (as the incident wasn't "on the job"). IOW it's better if he was just "never there".
Re:Politician's "thinking" (Score:4, Informative)
This is a bad idea. In emergency response training we had a lengthy discussion about this. When people witness a crime or even a heart attack they often don't respond because they expect someone else to have already called 911 or that someone else will be able to help the person better. You can have a man choking in a restaurant and 10 CPR/Heimlich trained people who all stand around doing nothing. If you don't realize that this is a natural reaction then you can't counter it if the time comes.
On the other side of the coin, if you do render assistance and you are not trained you can be sued. For example, if you assist in a car accident and drag someone from the wreckage who is later diagnosed with spinal injuries you could be sued for causing those injuries unless you can prove that they were in imminent danger and you are trained to move someone with spinal injuries.
Good Samaritan laws are meant to protect first responders, but against a good lawyer you can still lose.
Re:No (Score:3, Informative)
THEN it makes sense. As it stands, it does not.
Re:Politician's "thinking" (Score:3, Informative)
Here's the fastest thing to come up googling, I thought that sounded familiar: Worry Over VZW, Sprint Phones' 911 Alarm [slashdot.org]
Re:Politician's "thinking" (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Politician's "thinking" (Score:4, Informative)
Its intent is obviously to criminalize witnesses who do not intervene... and a poorly-thought-out law it is.
No, not at all. It's intent is to criminalize failure to report crimes you witness, not failure to intervene in crimes you witness.
There's a very large difference.
(My intent is not to defend the proposed law, only to correct your misinformation.)
Re:No (Score:3, Informative)
Think of step 1 as an instruction to compile it rather than execute it.
Then you start building an instruction list as you parse step 2-4:
a) Clap your hands.
b) Shout out that you are at step 3.
c) Jump up and down.
5. Whoops optimization, results are never evaluated so we can just compile them way.
6. Finish test, the result is do to nothing.
It's actually quite like what a compiler might have to do, think of 5 as variables going out of scope for example. Why did we perform those calculations? They make no sense (unless there's trickery like the mutable and volatile keyword involved), so we go back and delete those instructions. So the test didn't use the word "compile" but it's implicit in "read" that you should parse it and that the point of reading the whole before executing the rest is to execute it in a smarter way. If you want it said in an even geekier way, your instruction pointer should stay at 1. while you invoke a JIT compiler on the remaining executions, and once the JIT compiler finishes steps 2-5. are NOPed and you are done.
Re:Oblig (Score:2, Informative)
http://opencarry.org/ca.html [opencarry.org]
http://www.handgunlaw.us/states/california.pdf [handgunlaw.us]
Yes, and?
Re:A bit late? (Score:2, Informative)
My only reference so far is "it's a part of the official Qld first aid syllabus", based on the fact that my first aid instructor told me so.
From QUT's H&S site:
Even with the best intent, sometimes things could go wrong. The common law's position on this is it depends on all the circumstances of the case. Under current law, the fact that a person was acting in an emergency situation is relevant to deciding whether the person has been negligent. The emergency nature of the circumstances and the skills of the good Samaritan are taken into account in determining whether the good Samaritan has acted reasonably.
Most jurisdictions (apart from Queensland and Tasmania) have introduced laws to clarify the position of good Samaritans and to provide them with protection from liability for acts or omissions done or made in good faith. While Queensland does not yet have good Samaritan law to shield good Samaritans from civil liability like most other states, it is worth examining other states’ provisions to understand the key elements that form the protection. Although different from state to state, the essential elements for good Samaritans to be protected from civil liability include:
* The assistance must be given in circumstances of emergency;
* The acts or omissions are done or made in good faith and without reckless disregard for the safety of the person in distress or someone else;
and
* The assistance is provided without expectation of payment or other consideration.
However, such protection from liability does not apply if the good Samaritan was significantly impaired by alcohol or other recreational drug.
Which, on the face of it, looks less rosy (in QLD) than I was told, although perhaps things are better in other states. Google "Law Reform Act 1995 (Qld)" for this quote:
Liability at law shall not attach to a medical practitioner, nurse or other person prescribed under a regulation in respect of an act done or omitted in the course of rendering medical care, aid or assistance to an injured person in circumstances of emergency—
(a) at or near the scene of the incident or other occurrence constituting the emergency;
(b) while the injured person is being transported from the scene of the incident or other occurrence constituting the emergency to a hospital or other place at which adequate medical care is available;
if—
(c) the act is done or omitted in good faith and without gross negligence; and
(d) the services are performed without fee or reward or expectation of fee or reward.
So doctors and nurses ARE protected barring GROSS negligence (contrary to what I'd been told), although nothing yet has specifically contradicted what I was told about Good Samaritan law applying in Qld (I don't count QUT saying it doesn't, as they may just be covering their collective behinds).
AHA! Google "CIVIL LIABILITY (GOOD SAMARITAN) AMENDMENT BILL 2007" and read the PDF. This is Queensland legislation (which I'm interested in personally), but has commentary about the protections in other states.
Clause 4 inserts s 27A into chapter 2, part 1, division 7. This new provision inserts into the CLA legal protection for persons who assist persons in distress. Subsection (1) provides that civil liability will not attach to persons in relation to an act done or omitted to be done in the course of rendering first aid or other aid or assistance to a person in distress. Subsections s 27(1)(a) and (b) qualify this legal protection by requiring that such aid or assistance must be provided in circumstances of emergency and that the act done or omitted must have been in good faith and without reckless disregard for the safety of the person in distress or someone else.
And there you have it. Good samaritans are protected in Qld. For other states it appears, from references I've read, to be the same, but IANAL and YMMV. Googling this stuff isn't that bad: I got my final definitive reference by googling "good samaritan law queensland" (without the quotes).
Re:A bit late? (Score:3, Informative)
Modern liberalism is premised on the exact opposite. Modern liberalism is based in a sort of duty-based ethic whereas it's ethical to force others to do what you think is ethical.
Actually, no, that's modern conservatism. Modern conservatism tries to force people to behave according to conservative moral standards using the power of law and government. That's why conservatives pass all those law-and-order statutes, criminalize drug, sex, nudity, abortion, and other things.
Re:No (Score:1, Informative)
persay
per se