Student Suicides

In the early years of the 21st century, administrators in institutions of higher learning have become increasingly concerned about the phenomenon of student suicides on their campuses. This concern was prompted in part by a highly publicized suit between the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the family of a student who committed suicide (Shin v. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2005) and a 2002 judgment involving Ferrum College in Virginia, in which a federal trial court ruled that the estate of a student who killed himself by hanging had made out a cause of action for negligence against the college and one of its administrators (Schieszler v. Ferrum College, 2002). The rising suicide rate for young people also contributed to this concern (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2007). In fact, between 2000 and 2008, a variety of law review articles examined liability issues pertaining to suicide among college students. This entry reviews several legal rulings dealing with suicides by college students and discusses the liability of educational institutions for student suicides.

As of 2008, though, only a handful of published court decisions addressed the issue of institutional liability for the suicide death of college or university students. In two of these cases, state courts decided that suicide is an intervening cause that precludes third-party liability in their respective jurisdictions (Bogust v. Iverson, 1960; Jain v. State, 2000). In a third case, the Supreme Court of Wyoming found that University of Wyoming employees were immune from liability for a student's suicide (White v. University of Wyoming, 1998).

On the other hand, in Wallace v. Broyles (1998), a case involving the suicide death of a varsity athlete at the University of Arkansas, the Supreme Court of Arkansas was of the opinion that that the decedent's mother could proceed with a suit against athletic officials there on the basis of allegations that they gave her son prescription pain medication in violation of federal drug-dispensing laws. Dissenting justices argued that there was no evidence that the defendants actually gave the athlete prescription medications and that the majority had proceeded on the basis of “irrelevant, albeit unsavory, practices” in the athletic department (p. 719).

In addition, in Schieszler, a federal trial court in Virginia pointed out that the estate of a first-year student who committed suicide presented sufficient evidence to demonstrate that college officials were in a “special relationship” with the student, that they were aware that he was in danger of [Page 440]committing suicide, and that they failed to take reasonable precautions to prevent the suicide from occurring. The court reached this conclusion despite the fact that the college's dean of students responded immediately on learning that the student was suicidal by going to the student's dormitory room and talking with both him and his girlfriend. Moreover, the court was not satisfied even though the dean obtained a written promise from the student not to attempt suicide and followed up by making arrangements for a counseling agency to provide him with counseling.

The fact that only a few courts have issued published opinions addressing institutional liability for student suicides at colleges and universities notwithstanding, at least 17 court cases have considered this issue in the context of elementary or secondary schools. These courts handed down judgments that should be of interest to officials at colleges and universities. Some of these cases proceeded under common negligence principles, others alleged constitutional violations, and another group alleged both state tort claims and federal constitutional violations.

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