Crime & Traffic

The following question was originally submitted to John Roska, a lawyer and writer for the weekly column "The Law Q&A" in the Champaign News Gazette. The article has been updated to include changes in the law and additional information.

Question

A recent column said that if you’re in a car accident, and someone’s injured, you’re required to “render aid.” This means to reasonably help any person injured in the accident. But what if you’re just a witness? Are bystanders required to do anything?

Answer

No. There’s no “duty to rescue” in Illinois. Bystanders can’t be liable for doing nothing to help someone.

However, you can be liable for offering bad help. Or for starting to help, and stopping. If you do something, you must act reasonably.

The Illinois Supreme Court explained the basic legal rule in a 1996 case: “Our common law generally imposes no duty to rescue an injured stranger upon one who did not cause the injury in the first instance.”

However, if you caused the injury, you do have a duty to rescue. For example, you must help if you injured someone in a car accident because then, you're not just a bystander.

You also have a duty to rescue if you have a special relationship with the person needing to be rescued. Some examples of special relationships are between:

• Parents and children,
• Transportation providers and passengers, and  
• Property owners and guests.

So, a duty to rescue only exists if:

• You have a special relationship with the victim,
• You caused the injury, or
• You created the danger.

If you don't fit into any of these 3 categories, then you can stand by and do nothing. In other words, you are off the hook.

The idea that you can watch someone drown is upsetting and often clashes with moral teachings. For example, biblical stories like "The Good Samaritan" teach us to always help others in need. In the story, a man from Samaria helps an injured traveler when others would not help him. After the man's good act, Jesus tells the Good Samaritan, “Go and do likewise.”

But the "no duty to rescue" rule is often explained by seeing the difference between errors of commission and omission. A commission means you actively do something. An omission means you fail to do something.

Other explanations for why bystanders do not have a duty to rescue are:

• We shouldn’t rely on non-professionals for help,
• It may be difficult to figure out who in a crowd of people is liable, or
• Blaming bystanders might make people not want to help when they have to rescue someone.

Others point out that this harsh rule doesn’t really stop people from trying to rescue others. In fact, one scholar’s study says 60 times more rescuers die than accident victims who were not helped.

Since tort law liability requires that you must fail to do a duty to be at fault, the "no duty to rescue" rule takes away the blame for doing nothing. You can, however, be liable for doing something. If you act, you have a legal duty to act reasonably. If you don’t act reasonably, you may be negligent, and you could be liable.

I couldn’t find any Illinois cases imposing blame on regular, non-professional Good Samaritans who tried to help strangers. I therefore don’t have true-life examples of how someone would have to mess up to become liable to someone.

Illinois has a Good Samaritan Act. It mostly protects licensed health professionals and people with CPR training against punishment for providing free emergency assistance. For people with no special training, the Act only protects:

• Those helping a choking victim in a restaurant,
• Those helping in an emergency requiring a building evacuation, and
• Those giving or following emergency telephone instructions.