The Arizona Supreme Court ruled last week that the Deer Valley Unified School District is not liable for the murder of a female student in 2014, even though a school official knew the girl was planning an off-campus meeting with a male student who may have had propensity for violence.
“The issue before us is whether the school owed [Anastasia “Ana” Greer] a duty of care. We hold it did not owe her a duty under the circumstances here,” according to the unanimous opinion written by Vice Chief Justice Ann Timmer.
In early March 2014, Matthew Bolton, a student at the district’s Sandra Day O’Connor High School, argued with Ana, a fellow student he had previously dated. Matthew, 15, had also recently dated another student, Raven, whom Ana claimed Matthew had threatened.
Public records show Ana, 16, reported the threat to Raven, the high school’s vice principal, and an off-duty Phoenix police officer who worked as a school resource officer. As a result, arrangements were made to protect Raven, but Ana was not concerned for her own safety.
On March 7, 2014, Ana told the vice principal and the school resource officer of her plan to meet Matthew at a friend’s house in north Phoenix. Although Ana was advised by the officer to not go, neither adult made any effort to stop the girl nor notify her mother.
Ana was shot to death by Matthew outside the friend’s house that afternoon. The boy then killed himself.
In 2015, Diannah Dinsmoor sued Deer Valley Unified, the City of Phoenix, and several individuals for negligence. She argued school officials had a special relationship with students which included a duty to protect, even from events away from school property.
A Maricopa County judge dismissed Dinsmoor’s lawsuit against all of the defendants in 2018, ruling they had no duty to protect Ana under the circumstances of the case. But in June 2020, the Arizona Court of Appeals overruled the lower court judge on Dinsmoor’s claims against Deer Valley Unified and the school resource officer.
The appellate decision meant a jury would be asked to decide whether negligence occurred. However, that became moot when the district petitioned for review to the Arizona Supreme Court, leading to the Aug. 6 opinion.
According to Timmer’s opinion, the justices agreed a school-student relationship “imposes an affirmative duty on schools to protect students from unreasonable harm,” but such a duty only goes so far, she wrote.
“The key consideration is whether a known and tangible risk of harm arose that endangered the student while under the school’s custody and control,” Timmer wrote. “In such scenarios, students are deprived of the protection of their parent, and the school has an affirmative duty to protect them from such risks until they are safely released from the school’s custody and control.”
Once students leave a school’s control, that special relationship usually ends as students are “simultaneously released” to their parents’ or guardians’ care, Timmer wrote. “At that point, the school is relieved of any duty to affirmatively protect students from any hazards they encounter.”
As to the girl’s murder, “nothing in the record suggests that Matthew posed a risk to Ana before she safely left the District’s supervision and control on March 7,” Timmer wrote. “This is a tragic case, and we empathize with Dinsmoor for her great loss.”
The Arizona Charter Schools Association, Arizona School Boards Association, and Arizona School Risk Retention Trust filed a joint amicus curiae brief in support of the district.
After the shooting, Dinsmoor created the Anastasia Greer Foundation in response to her daughter’s murder “by a misdirected, sad, and lonely young man.” The foundation’s goal is to prevent other families from enduring the same loss in the future. More information can be found at http://www.hugsforana.com