# Mascaro v. Youth Study Center

> Supreme Court of Pennsylvania · April 7, 1987 · 514 Pa. 351

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9697046

## Case

- **Full name:** Michelle MASCARO, a Minor, and Kenneth Mascaro, a Minor, by Their Parents Kenneth Mascaro and Michelle Mascaro, Appellees, v. YOUTH STUDY CENTER, City of Philadelphia, Wilson Goode and Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Appellants
- **Court:** Supreme Court of Pennsylvania
- **Decided:** April 7, 1987
- **Citations:** 514 Pa. 351; 523 A.2d 1118; 1987 Pa. LEXIS 679
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Hutchinson
- **Judges:** Nix, Larsen, Flaherty, McDermott, Hutchinson, Zappala, Papadakos
- **Cited by:** 335 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- **Yellow flag:** Questioned by Burgan v. City of Pittsburgh, 115 Pa. Commw. 566 (1988).
- Negative treatments: 1
- Distinguished by: 2
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9697046

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- holding that the real estate exception “can be applied only to those cases where it is alleged the artificial condition or defect of the land itself causes the injury, not merely when it facilitates the injury by the acts of others, whose acts are outside the statute’s scope o…
- concluding that real estate exception to sovereign immunity did not apply to negligence claim against juvenile detention center after detainee escaped and caused injuries
- reasoning that Section 8542(b)(3) “must be narrowly interpreted given the expressed legislative intent to insulate political subdivisions from tort liability”

## Opinion text

HUTCHINSON, Justice,
concurring.
I join the majority opinion. I agree that the real estate exception to the Political Subdivision Tort Claims Act, 42 Pa.C.S. § 8542(b)(3), contemplates recovery only for the artificial condition or defect of the land itself and does not impose liability upon government entities for the acts of third parties. I write separately to emphasize that, on these facts, a proximate cause analysis would insulate appellants from liability for negligence. The appellants’ negligence, in failing to properly secure a juvenile detention center, may have been the cause-in-fact of the injuries suffered by the appellees. However, appellants’ omissions are not the legal cause of the harm due to the intervening criminal acts of Opher. Both cause-in-fact and legal causation must be present for a plaintiff to recover on a negligence theory.

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9697046. Public record. Not legal advice.