Also known as: reckless indifference · callous indifference · deliberate indifference
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A culpable mental state consisting of conscious disregard of a substantial and unjustifiable risk of serious harm to human life or to the legally protected rights or interests of others.
Raphael Rivera, a site foreman, clashed with a rival crew leader for months. After hours he loosened the safety harness anchor on the fortieth floor where the rival worked. The next morning the anchor failed and the rival fell to his death. The conduct meets the threshold of reckless indifference to an unjustifiably high risk to human life rather than ordinary criminal negligence.
Rachel Ramirez sued her landlord after repeated refusals to rent on racial grounds. Evidence showed the owner authorized an agent to apply screening rules that systematically excluded minority applicants. The jury found the owner's authorization reflected reckless indifference to the tenants' federally protected rights and awarded punitive damages.
Rowan Russell served as trustee of a family trust that required diversified investments. He placed nearly all assets in a single speculative venture without disclosure. The exculpatory clause could not shield him because the placement showed reckless indifference to the beneficiaries' interests.
Ronald Reed resented the ship's captain after months of disputes. Before a forecasted gale he secretly cut the captain's safety line while leaving others intact. The captain was swept overboard and drowned. The deliberate compromise of life-saving equipment demonstrated reckless indifference to an unjustifiably high risk to human life sufficient for implied malice.
Rina Rahman sold a used vehicle and stated it had never been in an accident. She had no belief about how the buyer would interpret the statement yet knew the odometer had been rolled back. The reckless indifference as to how the statement would be understood supported a finding of fraudulent misrepresentation.
Renata Russo fled after a traffic stop. An officer pursued at extreme speeds through city streets without regard for bystanders. The chase ended when the officer's vehicle struck and killed a pedestrian. The officer's conduct did not rise to the level of purpose to harm unrelated to arrest and therefore did not violate substantive due process.
On May 22, 1990, at approximately 8:30 p.m., Sacramento County sheriff’s deputy James Everett Smith responded to a call to break up a fight along with another officer, Murray Stapp. Upon returning to his patrol car, Stapp saw a motorcycle operated by 18-year-old Brian Willard carrying 16-year-old Philip Lewis as a passenger approaching at high speed. Neither boy had been involved in the fight that prompted the call. Stapp turned on his overhead rotating lights, yelled to the boys to stop, and pulled his patrol car closer to Smith’s in an attempt to pen the motorcycle in. Instead of pulling over, Willard slowly maneuvered the motorcycle between the two police cars and sped off. Smith immediately switched on his own emergency lights and siren, made a quick turn, and began pursuit at high speed. For 75 seconds over a course of 1.3 miles in a residential neighborhood, the motorcycle wove in and out of oncoming traffic, forcing two cars and a bicycle to swerve off the road, while the vehicles reached speeds up to 100 miles per hour with Smith following at a distance as short as 100 feet. The chase ended after the motorcycle tipped over as Willard tried a sharp left turn. By the time Smith slammed on his brakes, Willard was out of the way, but Lewis was not. The patrol car skidded into him at 40 miles per hour, propelling him some 70 feet down the road and inflicting massive injuries from which Lewis was pronounced dead at the scene. The District Court granted summary judgment for Smith. It reasoned that he was entitled to qualified immunity. Respondents could point to no state or federal opinion published before May 1990 supporting their view of a Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process right in the context of high-speed police pursuits. The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed. It held that the appropriate degree of fault to be applied to high-speed police pursuits is deliberate indifference to or reckless disregard for a person’s right to life and personal security. The court concluded that the law regarding police liability for death or injury caused by an officer during the course of a high-speed chase was clearly established at the time of Philip Lewis’s death. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to resolve a conflict among the Circuits over the standard of culpability on the part of a law enforcement officer for violating substantive due process in a pursuit case.
View caseReckless indifference requires conscious disregard of an unjustifiably high risk to human life and supports murder under the abandoned-and-malignant-heart theory. Criminal negligence involves a gross deviation from reasonable care that creates a substantial risk of death but lacks the conscious awareness of extreme danger needed for murder and supports only involuntary manslaughter.
Punitive damages may be awarded when the defendant's conduct shows reckless indifference to the rights of others. The trier of fact may consider the character of the act, the harm caused or intended, and the defendant's wealth in setting the amount.
No. An exculpatory term is unenforceable to the extent it relieves a trustee of liability for breach committed in bad faith or with reckless indifference to the purposes of the trust or the interests of the beneficiaries.
Yes. A reckless indifference to an unjustifiably high risk to human life constitutes implied malice and supports a murder conviction at common law.
…the "benevolent neutrality" that we have long considered the correct constitutional standard will quickly translate into the "callous indifference" that the Court has consistently held the Establishment Clause does not require. The Court today has ignored the wise admonition of Justice Goldberg that "the measure of constitutional…