“[P]ermitting an act, where one has knowledge that it is impending and has the power and duty to prevent it, is the equivalent of directing it, so far as legal responsibility therefor is concerned.”
How later courts described this case
- “[P]ermitting an act, where one has knowledge that it is impending and has the power and duty to prevent it, is the equivalent of directing it, so far as legal responsibility therefor is concerned.”
- city manager and chief of police liable for negligently failing to fire police officers known for brutality
- city manager, police chief
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
SHENK, J.
I concur in the judgment of reversal on the ground that the allegations of the complaint are sufficient to require the defendants Hassler and Wallman to answer, particularly the allegations of prior knowledge on their part of the vicious propensities of the malefactors, Pierce and Hancock, and of failure to institute timely disciplinary proceedings against them. These allegations, the truth of which is admitted for the purposes of the demurrer, bring the case fairly within the rules announced in Michel v. Smith, 188 Cal. 199 [ 205 P. 115 ], and similar eases. The civil service provisions of the Oakland City Charter are in essential respects the same as the provisions of the Los Angeles City Charter involved in the Michel case. A sound public policy supports the general rule of non-liability of superior public officers, for the torts of inferior civil service officers and employees and exceptions to that rule should not be extended; otherwise the assumption of public office with liability for the misdeeds of inferiors occupying civil service positions, many times numbering thousands, would indeed be a hazardous undertaking.
Respondents’ petition for a rehearing was denied June 14. 1943.