Do we have a duty to assist?
This discussion is based on Chapter 12: Helping. There are two questions, very similar. You may comment on one or both.
1) Good Samaritan Laws, including the one in Texas, protect passers-by from civil and criminal prosecution when rendering aid in an emergency situation. Support for that protection is fairly universal. However, at least ten states, including Vermont, Minnesota, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Washington have gone further. In those states, if you are aware of an emergency and DO NOT, at least, “summon assistance,” i.e., call 911, you are guilty of a violation or a misdemeanor. Punishments range from a $100 fine to jail time. These duty-to-rescue or duty-to-assist laws were passed after it was discovered that groups of people had stood and stared at victims in need of help, but did nothing . . . not even call for an ambulance. Some of these people had come back for a second look, this time bringing their friends!
In the summer of 2018, Florida officials ruled they could not charge a group of people who watched, and jeered, as a man drowned. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/5-florida-teens-who-mocked-and-recorded-drowning-man-avoid-charges-jamel-dunn-2018-06-24/
This discussion does NOT involve standard Good Samaritan Laws, but involves the added provision that failure to call 911 or render aid (if able and without endangering yourself) is a punishable offense. Does that go “too far” or would that result in more lives saved?
As an example, here is a summary of Minnesota’s law:
Duty to assist. A person at the scene of an emergency who knows that another person is exposed to or has suffered grave physical harm shall, to the extent that the person can do so without danger or peril to self or others, give reasonable assistance to the exposed person. Reasonable assistance may include obtaining or attempting to obtain aid from law enforcement or medical personnel. A person who violates this subdivision is guilty of a petty misdemeanor.
Duty to Rescue/Report Statutes
While simply expressing your own opinion is great, relate what you say to the factors that influence helping, mentioned in Chapter 12 and my chapter notes
