Also known as: proximate cause · proximate causation · proximate cause doctrine
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
A doctrine that limits liability to harms that are the direct and foreseeable result of the defendant's conduct. The doctrine treats later acts as intervening forces whose impact on legal causation must be evaluated under principles of foreseeability and risk rather than as automatic bars to recovery.
Paul Peterson allowed his minor son to drive the family car despite knowing the boy had a history of reckless speeding. The son struck and injured a pedestrian. A court examined whether Paul's failure to supervise constituted his own negligence that served as a proximate cause of the injury rather than imposing automatic vicarious liability on the parent-child relationship alone.
Penelope Price, a U.S. official, approved a plan from domestic headquarters that directed agents abroad to detain and question a suspect. The suspect suffered injury during the foreign operation. A court assessed whether the headquarters decision was sufficiently close to the ultimate injury to support liability under proximate causation principles.
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Preston Pratt and an accomplice robbed a store. During the robbery the victim suffered a fatal heart attack triggered by the stress of the crime. A court applied the proximate cause theory to determine whether the death was a direct result of the felony even though the victim had a preexisting condition.
Philip Powell was stopped without reasonable suspicion. Officers discovered an outstanding warrant and arrested him, finding evidence during the search incident to arrest. A court evaluated whether the discovery of the warrant was an intervening circumstance that broke the chain of proximate causation between the illegal stop and the evidence.
Pilar Pena invested in a business after receiving misleading reports from Imrex Co. The reports concealed overbilling that caused her financial loss. A court examined whether the pattern of racketeering activity was a proximate cause of her injury under the civil RICO provision.
An intervening force is a later act that actively operates after the defendant's negligence to help produce the harm. Courts then evaluate whether that force is superseding based on foreseeability and the scope of the risk created by the original negligence.
A third party's reckless or criminal flight is treated as superseding when it is extraordinary, independent, and outside the risks that made the defendant's conduct negligent, thereby cutting off liability even though the earlier negligence was a factual cause.
An intervening force is another actor or event that comes into play after the defendant's negligent act or omission and takes part in producing the plaintiff's harm. The characterization focuses on timing and active operation rather than on whether the force ultimately relieves the defendant of liability.
No. An intervening act becomes superseding only when it is highly extraordinary or of a character that makes it unfair to hold the original actor responsible. Foreseeable responses to the risk created by the negligence do not cut off liability.
…simply because the harm occurred on foreign soil. B Although not every headquarters case is rested on an explicit analysis of proximate causation, this notion of cause is necessary to connect the domestic breach of duty (at headquarters) with the action in the foreign country (in a case like this) producing the foreign harm or…