Judge rejects Raleigh’s motion to dismiss suit over 2022 parade death

A Wake County Superior Court judge has rejected Raleigh’s motion to dismiss a lawsuit from the family of an 11-year-old girl killed during the city’s 2022 Christmas parade. The judge determined that Raleigh could not rely on governmental immunity to avoid liability.

The driver who hit and killed Hailey Brooks was sentenced last November to 262 days behind bars in connection with her death. Landen Glass lost control of a truck that was pulling a float in the parade.

“[T]he Court concludes that Plaintiffs First Amended Complaint alleges facts which, taken as true and construed liberally in Plaintiffs favor, are sufficient to state claims for relief against the City,” Judge Bryan Collins wrote in an order filed Wednesday. “The Court further concludes that, at the Rule 12(b)(6) stage, dismissal is not warranted on the basis of the public duty doctrine. Accordingly, Defendant City of Raleigh’s motion to dismiss pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6) is DENIED.”

“The alleged negligent conduct at issue, for purposes of the City’s governmental-immunity motion, does not arise merely from permit issuance, traffic control, or traditional law-enforcement functions,” Collins wrote. “It arises from the planning, coordination, safety planning, crowd management, logistics, operational control, and execution of an event — namely, the Parade.”

“The City of Raleigh, through its Office of Special Events and other departments, played an extensive role in the planning, organization, coordination, safety planning, promotion, support, and operation of the Parade beyond merely receiving and evaluating a special-event application or issuing a permit,” the order added.

“The evidentiary record establishes a direct causal connection between the absence of adequate event safety measures and the collision that resulted in Hailey Brooks’ death,” Collins wrote. “The uncontroverted expert evidence demonstrates that the hazard the uncontrolled truck developed over a measurable and extended period of time. From the moment the driver lost control until impact, approximately 40.36 seconds elapsed while the vehicle traveled approximately 385.4 feet.”

“This time interval far exceeded the scientifically established perception-response times for hazard detection and reaction, which are generally on the order of approximately one to two seconds,” the court order continued. An expert witness “opined that properly trained and positioned event personnel would have had sufficient time to recognize the hazard, communicate the danger, and intervene to clear participants from the vehicle’s path.”

“Under accepted standards and as acknowledged and required by the City, the Parade required one trained crowd manager per 250 attendees, equating to approximately 200 crowd managers for a 50,000-person event,” Collins wrote. “The City deployed only approximately 36 officers to perform crowd management about 18% of the required number and neither required [Greater Raleigh Merchants Association] to provide additional crowd management resources nor communicated to GRMA that the crowd management resources provided by the City would be deficient.”

Raleigh police were focusing on spectators, not the parade’s participants, Collins explained. “This left the interaction between Parade participants and moving vehicles within the Parade footprint without comparable monitoring or control,” he wrote. “The absence of these measures materially impaired the ability to detect, communicate, and respond to the developing hazard.”

“Governmental immunity protects a municipality only when the alleged tortious conduct arises from a governmental function,” Collins explained. “Governmental immunity does not protect a municipality when the alleged tortious conduct arises from a proprietary function.”

“The specific conduct at issue here arose from the City’s event planning, event coordination, event management, safety planning, crowd management, operational control, and execution of the Raleigh Christmas Parade, not merely from permit issuance, traffic control, or traditional law-enforcement activity,” he added. “The General Assembly has not designated event planning, event coordination, event management, safety planning, crowd management, or operational control and execution of a parade as governmental functions for purposes of governmental immunity.”

“[T]he allegations in the First Amended Complaint, together with the competent evidence proffered by Plaintiff, sufficiently establish that the allegedly negligent conduct, which arose from proprietary functions, directly and proximately caused Hailey Brooks’ death,” Collins wrote.

“Judge rejects Raleigh’s motion to dismiss suit over 2022 parade death” was originally published on www.carolinajournal.com.