## Facts

- Mechelle Medcalf visited a condominium building at 1633 Washington Boulevard in Stamford, Connecticut, at about 9:00 p.m. on June 20, 1990.
- Washington Heights Condominium Association, Inc. owned the premises, and Professional Property Management Company, Inc. managed operation, management, and repair.
- Medcalf parked in a street-level lot near the building and waited outside the lobby entrance.
- Medcalf used the building’s telephone security intercom to contact the resident she was visiting.
- A person inside attempted to admit Medcalf by using the electronic buzzer system intended to unlock the lobby door, but the system failed.
- Medcalf remained outside while the resident came downstairs to open the door manually.
- Before entry was achieved, Medcalf was assaulted outside the building by a third party and suffered injuries.
- Medcalf sued the association and manager for negligence, alleging that failure to maintain the intercom/buzzer system was a proximate cause of her injuries.
- A jury found for Medcalf only on the intercom/buzzer maintenance theory (and not on other alleged security deficiencies) and awarded $4,778.44 in economic damages and $110,000 in noneconomic damages.
- The trial court denied defense motions challenging the verdict; defendants appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether sufficient evidence supported a finding that defendants’ negligent failure to maintain the intercom/buzzer system was a proximate cause of Medcalf’s injuries from a third-party criminal assault.
2. Whether the criminal assault was within the foreseeable scope of the risk created by the intercom/buzzer malfunction (or instead was a superseding cause as a matter of law).

## Decision

- The appellate court reversed the judgment for Medcalf.
- The court held the evidence was legally insufficient on proximate cause because the malfunctioning intercom/buzzer was not a substantial factor, in the relevant legal sense, in causing the assault injuries.
- The court concluded the assault was outside the scope of the risk that made the failure to maintain the entry system negligent.
- The case was remanded with direction to render judgment for the defendants.

## Legal Principles

- Proximate cause requires more than factual (“but-for”) causation; it requires a reasonable connection between the defendant’s conduct and the plaintiff’s harm.
- Connecticut applies a “substantial factor” inquiry that asks whether the harm suffered was of the same general nature as the foreseeable risk created by the defendant’s negligence.
- A defendant is not liable for harm that is different from the harms whose risks made the defendant’s conduct tortious.
- An intervening criminal act may preclude liability when it is not within the scope of risk created by the defendant’s negligence and operates as a superseding cause.

## Conclusion

Because the risk created by a nonfunctioning entry intercom/buzzer did not make a guest’s violent assault outside the building reasonably foreseeable as the same general type of harm, the defendants’ maintenance failure was not the proximate cause of Medcalf’s injuries, and judgment was ordered for the defendants.


Medcalf v. Wash. Heights Condo. Ass'n, Inc., 57 Conn. App. 12, 747 A.2d 532 (Conn. App. Ct. 2000)