Thursday, January 29, 2026
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School District Is Not Liable for Student’s Off-Campus Suicide, C.A. Declares
Opinion Says High Court Decision Does Not Dictate Contrary Result
By a MetNews Staff Writer
A school district is not liable to the parents of an 11-year-old girl who committed suicide, allegedly due to schoolyard bullying, Div. Four of the First District Court of Appeal has held, rejecting the plaintiffs’ contention that the trial judge, in denying the defendant’s motion for summary judgment, faithfully applied a 1978 opinion of the California Supreme Court.
The state high court’s decision, came in Hoyem v. Manhattan Beach City School District. Justice Mathew Tobriner wrote for the 4-3 majority in saying that a Los Angeles Superior Court commissioner erred in dismissing with prejudice causes of action based on a 10-year-old boy, Michael Hoyem, having incurred injuries when struck by a car after he roamed from the school before classes had ended.
The question before the high court was whether Education Code §44808 conferred immunity. The Court of Appeal—in its opinion decided Dec. 30 and certified for publication on Tuesday—dealt with that same issue but, it determined, the fact situations are differentiatable.
It granted a petition for a writ of mandate to the extent of directing that the trial court grant summary judgment in favor of the district based on wrongful death allegations.
Wording of Statute
Sec. 44808 provides that “no school district…shall be responsible or in any way liable for the conduct or safety of any pupil of the public schools at any time when such pupil is not on school property.” But it adds exceptions, saying, “unless such district… has undertaken to provide transportation for such pupil to and from the school premises, has undertaken a school-sponsored activity off the premises of such school, has otherwise specifically assumed such responsibility or liability or has failed to exercise reasonable care under the circumstances.”
Tobriner said:
“In the instant case…we have no occasion to probe the scope of school authorities’ ‘off premises’ supervisory duty, for in this case defendant’s alleged negligence relates to the district’s firmly established duty to exercise due care in supervising Michael while he was on school premises.”
He added:
“Contrary to defendant’s assertion, no California decision suggests that when a school district fails to properly supervise a student on school premises, the district can automatically escape liability simply because the student’s ultimate injury occurs off school property.”
Parents’ Contention
In the case before the Court of Appeal, the parents, Vionalyn Caguin and Renato Caguin, argued that school officials, like those in Hoyem, had failed in their duties on the school premises, namely to protect their daughter, Therese, from bullying, to take seriously her suicidal ideation, and to report their concerns to her parents.
Disagreeing, Alameda Superior Court Judge Jason Clay, serving on assignment, wrote:
“We conclude the District is statutorily immune from liability for harm to the Caguins caused by Therese’s off-campus suicide which occurred when she was not and should not have been under the immediate and direct supervision of the District’s employees. Therefore, the trial court erred by not granting summary adjudication on the three causes of action premised on such harm.”
He continued: “This conclusion does not extend to the survival claim, which is premised on alleged on-campus harm to Therese that occurred when Therese was under the supervision of the District’s employees. Accordingly, we grant the petition in part and deny it in part.”
In denying summary judgment in connection with causes of action based on wrongful death, Solano Superior Court Judge Stephen Gizzi found that there were triable issues as to whether the district “failed to exercise reasonable care in the circumstances that take this case out of section 44808 immunity.”
In Hoyem, Tobriner said, in a footnote: “[T]he language of the statute itself specifies that its limitation on liability does not apply to the allegations of the instant complaint. Although the initial portion of the statute provides that ‘no school district shall be responsible...for the conduct or safety of any pupil...at any time when such pupil is not on school property,’ the section goes on explicitly to withdraw this grant of immunity whenever the school district, inter alia, ‘has failed to exercise reasonable care under the circumstances. Plaintiffs’ complaint alleges that the school district failed to exercise reasonable care. Assuming, as we must on appeal from a sustained demurrer, the truth of the allegations of the complaint…, by its own terms, does not bar liability in the present case.”
Clay said that, as most courts have construed it, “the ‘reasonable care’ phrase in section 44808 is a standard of care applicable to the preceding three phrases and does not create an independent basis for liability.”
He remarked that it would be “nonsensical for statutory immunity to evaporate whenever a school district” failed to use reasonable care.
The case is Vallejo City Unified School District v. Superior Court, A.173303.
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