Boyd v. Racine Currency Exchange, Inc. Case Brief

Boyd v. Racine Currency Exchange, Inc.

306 N.E.2d 39 | 56 Ill. 2d 95 | 1973 Ill. LEXIS 211

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Takeaway

In short, this case holds that Illinois does not make a business liable to a hostage-invitee merely because it refused an armed robber's demand; imposing such a duty would improperly strengthen criminals' bargaining power without reliably protecting customers.

Background

John Boyd entered Racine Currency Exchange as a business customer on April 27, 1970. An armed robber put a gun to Boyd's head and told teller Blanche Murphy, who was behind bulletproof glass, to give him money or open the door or the robber would kill Boyd. Murphy fell to the floor rather than comply, and the robber shot and killed Boyd.

Boyd's widow brought a wrongful-death action against the currency exchange and Murphy. She alleged that they negligently refused the robber's demand, maintained an undisclosed policy of protecting money at the expense of customers' lives, failed to train employees for armed robberies, and employed an incompetent teller. The Cook County circuit court dismissed the complaint for failure to state a cause of action. The appellate court reversed and remanded, but the Illinois Supreme Court granted leave to appeal, reversed the appellate court, and affirmed the dismissal.

Issues

Issue #1

Whether a business proprietor and its employee owe an invitee a duty to comply with an armed robber's demand when the robber is threatening the invitee as a hostage.

Holding

No. A proprietor does not owe an invitee a duty to yield to an armed criminal's demand in order to protect the invitee from the criminal's threatened violence.

Reasoning

Negligence requires the breach of a duty owed to the plaintiff. Although Illinois generally recognizes no duty to anticipate third-party criminal acts unless such acts are reasonably foreseeable, the Court found that the usual foreseeability cases did not control. Those cases concern precautions against a possible future crime; this case concerned whether a proprietor becomes liable by resisting an imminent criminal demand during an ongoing robbery.

The Court applied the duty analysis stated in Lance v. Senior: foreseeability is not enough by itself. A court must also weigh the likelihood of injury, the burden of guarding against it, and the consequences of imposing that burden. Here, Boyd's injury might have been avoided only through complete compliance with the robber's demand, but even that conclusion was speculative because the robber might still have harmed him.

Compliance also could have endangered Murphy. The robber demanded either money or that Murphy open the door, and opening the protected area would have exposed her to a serious risk of bodily injury. The law could not require her to sacrifice her own safety merely because a criminal had selected Boyd as a hostage.

Most importantly, imposing a legal duty to comply would give criminals additional leverage. A business faced with a hostage situation would be forced to choose between surrendering to the criminal and risking civil liability to the hostage if it resisted. The Court reasoned that criminals would be the certain beneficiaries of such a rule, while any protection to customers would remain uncertain and could encourage the use of hostages in future robberies.

Because defendants had no duty to accede to the robber's demand, the complaint's allegations concerning the exchange's alleged policy, employee training, and Murphy's competence did not state a negligence claim based on the refusal to comply. The circuit court therefore properly dismissed the action.

Dissents

Justice Goldenhersh

Reasoning

Justice Goldenhersh would have affirmed the appellate court and allowed the case to proceed. In his view, the majority overlooked the principles reflected in Restatement (Second) of Torts sections 302B and 449, which address liability where a defendant's conduct creates a risk of harm through another person's intentional or criminal act.

He rejected the majority's conclusion that nothing Murphy could have done might have spared Boyd. At the pleading stage, he reasoned, it was premature to resolve whether defendants' conduct proximately caused Boyd's death or whether Murphy had sufficient time and ability, under the circumstances, to exercise the judgment expected of an ordinarily prudent person. Those were fact questions for a judge or jury after evidence was presented.