Tort Law

Haynes v. Harwood

[1935] 1 KB 146

Facts

• The defendants’ servant left a horse-drawn van unattended on a busy street.
• The street was frequently used by pedestrians, including children.
• The horses were not adequately secured or supervised.
• A boy threw a stone at the horses.
• The frightened animals bolted and began moving dangerously through the crowded street.
• A woman and several children were directly in the path of the runaway horses.
• Haynes, a police constable, saw the danger.
• Acting in the course of his duty, he attempted to stop the horses and protect the persons in the street.
• Haynes successfully diverted or restrained the animals but suffered serious injuries in doing so.
• He sued the owner of the van.
• The defendant argued that:
o the boy’s act broke the chain of causation;
o Haynes voluntarily accepted the danger; and
o his intervention was his own independent decision.

• Whether the defendants’ negligence caused the danger requiring rescue.
• Whether the boy’s mischievous act was an intervening cause.
• Whether Haynes’s rescue attempt amounted to volenti or contributory negligence.

• A person whose negligence creates danger may be liable to a rescuer injured while reasonably responding to it.
• Rescue is a foreseeable consequence of creating danger to others.
• The chain of causation is not broken by:
o a foreseeable act of mischief; or
o a reasonable rescue attempt.
• A rescuer does not ordinarily consent to the defendant’s negligence merely by knowingly confronting danger.
• Volenti applies only where the rescuer freely accepts the risk in a manner relieving the defendant of liability.
• A rescuer may be denied recovery only where the intervention is so unreasonable or reckless that it amounts to a new and independent cause.
• The law generally recognises that “danger invites rescue.”

• Leaving horses unattended on a busy street created a clear risk that they might become frightened and bolt.
• The possibility of children interfering with the animals was also foreseeable in that location.
• The boy’s conduct therefore did not introduce a wholly unexpected danger.
• It activated the risk created by the servant’s failure to supervise and secure the horses.
• Once the horses bolted towards pedestrians, it was foreseeable that someone—particularly a police officer—would attempt a rescue.
• Haynes did not intervene for entertainment or personal advantage.
• He acted to protect a woman and children from an immediate risk of serious injury.
• His conduct was courageous but not so foolhardy that it broke the causal chain.
• Knowledge that stopping runaway horses was dangerous did not mean that Haynes agreed to waive any claim against the person responsible for creating the emergency.
• The defendant’s negligence remained an operative cause throughout the incident.
• Public policy also supported protecting reasonable rescuers. Denying recovery merely because they knowingly face danger would discourage intervention and allow negligent defendants to benefit from another person’s courage.

• The Court of Appeal held the defendant liable for Haynes’s injuries.
• Leaving the horses unattended constituted negligence.
• The boy’s act was a foreseeable occurrence and did not break causation.
• Haynes’s rescue was a natural and reasonable response to the danger.
• Volenti did not apply because he had not freely agreed to absolve the defendant from responsibility.