Of all the proposals following the horrific Newtown school shooting, this has to be the worst: a Connecticut attorney has just filed legal papers seeking to recover $100 million from the State Board of Education on behalf of a 6-year-old survivor.
New Haven, CT attorney Irv Pinsky filed a claim last week with state Claims Commissioner J. Paul Vance Jr., whose office must give permission before a lawsuit can be filed against the state, according to the Hartford Courant. (Good luck with that.)
The child, who has not been named to protect her privacy, heard “cursing, screaming, and shooting” over the school intercom when the gunman opened fire, according to the claim. (I am not repeating the shooter’s name here, to minimize the fame that comes with violent rampages.) She suffered “emotional and psychological trauma and injury, the nature and extent of which are yet to be determined,” the claim said.
Don’t get me wrong, I am generally in favor of tort claims when they are meritorious. Trial lawyers and financial judgments against companies that put dangerous products into the marketplace are one of the reasons we live in a very safe country. When I am strapping myself into a zip line in, say, Nicaragua, I think, “does this country have tort liability?” On behalf of clients I have brought many personal injury and wrongful death cases. But I would not have taken this one.
To sue a school where the women in charge heroically rushed the shooter, paying with their lives, feels wrong-headed, even callous. In legal parlance, a deranged gunman bursting in and murdering children with an assault weapon was not foreseeable. Even in a country with regular mass shootings, this was a shock to us all. Had there been an armed guard, the gunman, with the element of surprise, could have easily shot him first and then proceeded. What more could the school have done? Become a bulletproof fortress with soldiers stationed shoulder-to-shoulder around the perimeter?
I hope the state of Connecticut rejects this claim, and that other lawyers turn down similar cases. Tougher gun laws and mental health reform are the obvious solutions here, not lawsuits against schools.
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not necessarily those of Avvo.com.
4 comments
Taylor
This is really outrageous. I can not believe that a legitimate lawyer will even process a lawsuit against a school board like this. I hope the state wins this one. This world is sue happy.. I am sorry to even have to comment on this. The lawyer who started this lawsuit should have his license revoked.
Steve Beinart
She's right that a gunman could easily shoot a uniformed guard. The solution is to encourage and enable un-uniformed teachers and others to carry weapons.
Fladabosco
The school had a uniformed guard and the shooter was denied access to the school but he shot the locks out and came in.
I am a teacher and the idea of arming us is a crazy as the Newtown shooter. First of all I didn't sign up to take a bullet for someone. I have never read a teacher's job description that included being a human shield or a superhero.
I always wonder if people who think that putting guns in a classroom is a good idea have ever been in a 2nd grade class. The odds are better that the kids will find the gun and there will be tragedy or some teacher will lose it and shoot that one kid who never shuts up.
dampscribbler
This is not just callous, it is deeply profoundly dangerous on a cultural level. To even suggest that a response to this magnitude of evil can be "more" or "less" appropriate, and that those not directly involved should be held accountable for the response of those who were involved is to embrace "the banality of evil" and further its grip on our society. We must call out these fallacies and challenge them where they occur.