Should hunting partners share the blame for an accidential death?

[pak29]

What's your opinion? Should a man ever be held to answer for another man's conduct with a gun? Say two men go hunting, one the mentor, the other a first-time hunter. The mentor leaves the rookie alone, and a tragedy occurs- through his own carelessness and disregard of the hunting and gun safety rules he has been taught, the rookie shoots and kills a third hunter.

Without question, the shooter is responsible for his acts, and should go to jail for manslaughter. Should the mentor be held legally responsible for leaving the rookie alone? If you were on a jury, would you vote that he should bear some portion of the damages for the death of the other man? Or, however tragic the accident may be, should be immune because he didn't pull the trigger?

 

[CoRoMo]

The age of the shooter would come into play.

If the shooter was a minor, many states may hold the guardian responsible for their actions.

 

[Tinman357]

Is this a serious question? I won't hold any one responsible for my actions. No matter how stupid they are..

Are you an attorney testing the waters to get more money?

 

[Tim the student]

through his own carelessness and disregard of the hunting and gun safety rules he has been taught

Emphasis mine. No, given this situation, no way anyone should be responsible other than the one who has been taught (properly I think we can assume), who was then careless.

 

[CoRoMo]

Without question, the shooter is responsible for his acts...

I'll add one disagreement about that. If the hunter slipped and fell, the firearm discharges, killing another hunter, the accident wouldn't place as much responsibility onto the shooter as if he took a wild shot into a moving bit of foliage.

 

[danprkr]

The flip side of freedom is responsibility. You can't ultimately have one without the other. So no the responsibility rests with the trigger puller ONLY!

 

[RS14]

"disregard of the hunting and gun safety rules he has been taught."

That decides it absolutely.

It is permitted, though not advisable, to learn to hunt on your own, after satisfying all legally required courses and such. The mentor is not required to baby-sit the novice. We wouldn't hold him liable if he just gave good, general advice before the novice went off on a trip by himself, and I wouldn't hold him liable here. Even if he said nothing, an adult should be sensible enough to use caution in firing a gun. If the mentor gave negligently bad advice, maybe--"just shoot at anything that moves," or something of that nature. But leaving a fellow adult on their own in the woods with a gun is, by itself, not negligent.

That said, I'd still feel really bad if I were the mentor.

 

[dakotasin]

assuming the shooter was majority age, no way should the mentor be held legally responsible.

ethically and morally, sure, a small part - but his demons will torment him for the remainder of his life. no need to pile on.

 

[Hokkmike]

You know, to some extent this is done a bit today. Ever notice how something gone wrong or some misdeed is clearly not the perpetrator's fault but the fault of those who, by comission or omission, influenced him?

My answer to your question is that unless the actor is a minor who is directly under the supervision of a cooperating adult or an actor who was give faulty dangerous instruction by that person that no one should bear responsibility for anothers gun tragedy.

 

[Schutzen]

There are too many unknown variables in this question.
A) How responsible a person is the novice hunter? I know people I do not want to be in the same county with if they have a firearm.
B) Did the novice have quality instruction about hunting & gun safety?
C) Did the mentor take the novice to a site suitable for a novice hunter?
D) Did the mentor just leave to novice totally unsupervised or was it; "I'll walk back to the truck and grab our lunch, you sit tight until I get back."

Each incident needs to be judged on its own merit or lack there of.

 

[Nicodemus38]

the states that have a mentoring system for youth hunters require the mentoring hunter to be a legal adult 21 or older, and to be within a distance of the youth/mentored hunter can be conversed with in normal voices and be in direct control of said youth.

however unless it was 13 year old kid with legal adult mentor, its kind of hard to prove if the mentor knew what was going on. its the legal gray area.

 

[emerson]

You need to flesh out your case. Too many 'facts and circumstances' regarding your hypothetical (?) question are left unanswered.

In general I would say that I believe in personal responsibility.

 

[Dr.Mall Ninja]

This question is ridicoulus you want someone else to go to jail, because I guy cant use common sense and hurts himself? most gun safety is pretty much common sense.

 

[LibShooter]

The "mentor" is not responsible unless he were a paid guide or instructor. And then only if he had reason to believe the shooter was incapable of following safety rules.

 

[Macgille]

How many fingers were on the trigger? One? Then one person bears the responsibility.

 

[psyopspec]

Should a man ever be held to answer for another man's conduct with a gun?

No.

The "mentor" is not responsible unless he were a paid guide or instructor. And then only if he had reason to believe the shooter was incapable of following safety rules.

Is my driver's ed instructor responsible if I get into a crash just after leaving his care?

Is my 7th grade health teacher liable if I incur a health condition related to obesity?

Can I sue the man who taught me to enjoy a good cigar if I get lung cancer?

If someone is teaching me how to swim, and I jump in the deep end when he turns his back... you get where I'm going.

 

[LibShooter]

Is my driver's ed instructor responsible if I get into a crash just after leaving his care?

Yes, IF he knows you have no idea how to safely drive a car, tosses you the keys, and you're still in class.

That would be like hiring a guide to teach you how to hunt big game. During instruction you show no regard for what he's trying to teach. Then with full knowledge you don't know and don't care about safety rules, he takes you out with other hunters and says, "Have at it." You then fire at a Wildebeast as it runs through camp, missing the target and hitting the guy cooking dinner behind the prey. Then I think he has some responsibility. If I were that instructor i would feel responsible.

 

[DoubleTapDrew]

If the mentor can be held responsible then the anti-gun community will be ahead of the game by raising the stakes and discouraging the teaching of new shooters/hunters. It's hard enough to get young people involved in the sport and get the number of hunters back up without throwing more negative legal ramifications into the mix.

Then with full knowledge you don't know and don't care about safety rules, he takes you out with other hunters and says, "Have at it." You then fire at a Wildebeast as it runs through camp, missing the target and hitting the guy cooking dinner behind the prey. Then I think he has some responsibility.

I'm sure he would feel horrible for the rest of his life. The shooter would rot in prison. Like others said, with freedom comes responsibility. If you kill someone else because you are a jackass there are consequences.

 

[Cosmoline]

As the plaintiff lawyers would tell you, the closest one with money is automatically at fault.

Personally I would only find liability if there was some species of negligent entrustment at work. A newbie trained for one firearm handed a completely different type. Or worse handed a newbie handed something way beyond his skill level because the entrusting party thinks it's funny. I've seen such conduct on youtube. In such cases the entrusting party has done something independently negligent or reckless.

Simply being near something that happens, though, should not be a basis for liability. A group of hunters are not equivalent to a business partnership.

 

[DeepSouth]

Should hunting partners share the blame for an accidential death?

Should a man ever be held to answer for another man's conduct with a gun?

Should the mentor be held legally responsible for leaving the rookie alone?

If you were on a jury, would you vote that he should bear some portion of the damages for the death of the other man?

No........

 

[David E]

The Original Post reminds one of an ambulance chaser.......

 

[pak29]

Gee, thanks, David.

Seriously, thanks for all the responses. It seems that the consensus is pretty strongly against any sort of liability for the mentor.

I think that the comments about personal responsiblity and questions about the mentor's actual control hit the heart of the issues that would decide such a case: The mentor should probably be responsible only the extent that he actually took genuine control of the situation, and did so without being reasonably careful. As others have posted, he seems to be more blameworthy if the shooter was a minor (likely to be less careful and responsible than an adult), was a particularly untrustworthy adult, was being paid to guide and instruct, etc. If a lot of these factors are present though, doesn't "personal responsibility" demand that he answer for the part he played in the death? An actual finding of liability seems unlikely, but juries do crazy things. That's why I posed the issue to the group.

But, it bears saying, as the original hypothetical stated, "the shooter is responsible for his acts, and should go to jail for manslaughter." I would never say that he wasn't. I was just wondering what the THR community thought about the responsibility of others who play a role, albeit indirect, in the negligent act.

 

[AKElroy]

I am with the majority here. Only the shooter has LEGAL responsibility for this. However, if they were brand new & relying on me to guide them, then I would likely wonder forever if I could have said or done something better to have prevented a tragedy.

 

[ClayInTX]

I will address this by listing the questions posed by psyopspec. Psyopspec, I’m not picking on you personally, it’s just that your posed questions are apropos.


Is my driver's ed instructor responsible if I get into a crash just after leaving his care?
Is my 7th grade health teacher liable if I incur a health condition related to obesity?
Can I sue the man who taught me to enjoy a good cigar if I get lung cancer?
If someone is teaching me how to swim, and I jump in the deep end when he turns his back... you get where I'm going.


My opinion agrees with the majority here, but what we have as an opinion based upon logic and what happens in court is many times very different.

For the questions posed by Psyopspec there have been, almost, exactly these same things taken to court. Do you recall McDonalds getting sued because their hamburgers made someone fat? I believe the case was thrown out but it did have an effect on McDonalds’ marketing.

As Cosmoline said, it’s who has the money. Many years ago I knew a man who ran a go-kart track. He avoided lawsuits because he had absolutely NO insurance.

However, bottom line, I agree the mentor has no responsibility as the OP stated the scenario. I’d be a lousy lawyer.

 

[MachIVshooter]

I'll add one disagreement about that. If the hunter slipped and fell, the firearm discharges, killing another hunter, the accident wouldn't place as much responsibility onto the shooter as if he took a wild shot into a moving bit of foliage.

Who traipses about the woods in pursuit of game with the safety off? Not I, and I'll actually open the action if I'm going to be hiking in an area where slipping and falling is particularly likely judging by the terrain.

And I'm in agreement with everyone else about respnsibilty.