Police/Fire Department Negligence/Special Relationship

A City has infrared detectors mounted at certain signalized intersections to detect approaching emergency vehicles. The detection then triggers the signals into a phase that provides a green light for the emergency vehicles and a red light for cross-traffic. A fire engine with lights and siren activated approached an intersection with a red traffic signal. If the signal does not change to green, even with lights and siren activated, the engineer must still obey the rules of the road and not encroach the intersection until it is safe to do so. The signal did not cycle from red to green for the engineer. When the cross-traffic driver entered on a green light, the fire truck T-boned her car causing it to roll three times and causing the driver to sustain serious injuries.

A police officer on a side street activated his lights and siren just prior to entering an intersection against a red light for him. The driver on the through street never heard the siren nor saw the activated lights. When the driver entered the intersection, the officer T-boned his vehicle. The questions were how long before entering on the red light did the officer activate his lights and siren, and did he proceed with reasonable care making sure that it was safe for him to enter the intersection while responding to the emergency.

A police officer in pursuit with lights and siren activated was going in excess of 50 mph on a main artery in an urban area. He was weaving between cars that had stopped for him. Due to his speed and the vehicles stopped in traffic, his view and the view of a driver turning left in front of him onto this main artery were blocked. The police car rear-ended the left-turning passenger vehicle at 50 mph.

A police officer is stopped for a red light in the number 2 of 2 lanes. Next to him is a SUV in the number 1 lane, also stopped. While stopped, the officer observes a traffic violation by a car going in the opposite direction. When the light turns green, the officer immediately negotiates a U-turn to detain the offending driver. The officer starts his U-turn pulling in front of the SUV in the number 1 lane. The driver of the SUV then pulls forward on the green light and hits the officer’s vehicle.

A City street is closed to traffic with a reserve police officer monitoring the intersection by sitting in his marked police SUV behind a road closed sign. The SUV is angled to block traffic with all emergency lights activated. A car arrives at the closed road, stops, allows the front seat passenger to approach the officer to ask for permission to drive down the street. The officer steps out of his SUV, asks the passenger what he can do to assist her. She tells him that she would like to drop off other passengers at an Air BnB. As they stand in the street, protected by the front to the SUV, the police lights and road closed sign, within seconds a DUI driver runs through the road closure striking both of them causing serious injuries to the woman and minor injuries to the reserve officer. The woman sues the City and Officer claiming that his actions created a special relationship.