Posted: May 19th, 2017

During a party, Morgan accidentally knocked a glass plate from a 16th floor balcony. It shattered on the concrete walkway below. Fortunately no one was hit, but the next day a boy playing Frisbee in his bare feet cut his foot on one of the glass shards. Morgan is prosecuted for reckless assault. Her lawyer argues that Morgan’s act Criminal Law – Professor Humbach Spring, 2011 Page 9. was not the proximate cause of the boy’s injury. Which of the following points would not (even if supported by the evidence) be relevant to this argument?

During a party, Morgan accidentally knocked a glass plate from a 16th floor balcony. It shattered on the concrete walkway below. Fortunately no one was hit, but the next day a boy playing Frisbee in his bare feet cut his foot on one of the glass shards. Morgan is prosecuted for reckless assault. Her lawyer argues that Morgan’s act Criminal Law – Professor Humbach Spring, 2011 Page 9. was not the proximate cause of the boy’s injury. Which of the following points would not (even if supported by the evidence) be relevant to this argument? a. The boy’s choice to go barefoot was a voluntary human intervention. b. The act of stepping on the shard was not done in response to Morgan’s reckless act. c. Morgan at no point failed to use the care that a reasonable person would have used in her situation. d. The choice to forego the apparent safety shoes superseded Morgan’s causal contribution.