Does your country have a Duty to rescue or Good Samaritan law?

15 comments

1. If you’re going to use this thread to update the Wikipedia page then you’ll need to make sure all answers are properly sourced. u/TonyGaze u/purpleslug is it worth making an extra rule for this thread? Or even just a pinned post?

2. Finland: Yes.

   If you spot someone unconscious or out of control in dangerous conditions (such as stripped naked and high out of their mind in cold weather), you need to help them, usually by calling the national emergency phone number.

   In a typical situation, you’ll receive instructions from the national emergency phone number while helping someone and they’ll send in the emergency services, or in some cases the police. Follow their instructions and you can feel you’ve done everything right. It would take a very weird situation for someone to get in trouble by helping/trying to help.

3. Just like wikipedia says we have “duty to rescue” instead. If you can without risking your own health help someone in danger you must do so. The article also states that you can’t obstruct others helping. Just like in Good Samaritan Law you can’t be charged for what you did in good faith.

4. Yep, the Estonian Penal Code has a clause for refusal to provide assistance in case of a life-threatening situation, which is punishable up to 3 years of imprisonment. The Penal Code also has clauses for decriminalizing proportional acts in case of self-defence and necessity.

5. Sweden: No (not even a duty to rescue)

6. Jup, we have pretty much two categories, one that requires you te help a person in danger if you can without endangering yourself, and one that forbids you from abandoning a person if you’re legally or contractually obliged to help them.

   We also have a law that allows you to claim costs made if you reasonably protect other peoples interests without a legal requirement to do so, which I’d assume would also extend to damages from protecting peoples interest when there is a legal requirement.

   Having said that, it’s insanely difficult, if not impossible, to establish the degree to which you were able to help, so oftentimes just calling the police or an ambulance will suffice.

7. To some degree, yes. There is no general duty however and you cannot be legally punished for not helping someone who is drowning. But in a lot of cases you have a duty to help or at least report a crime or call an ambulance.

8. Yes, that law actually has a funny name – lit. “you shall not stand on the blood of your fellow”

9. Spain: Title IX of the Penal Code. Articles 195 and 196. On the ommision of the duty to rescue. [Both articles of the penal code](https://noticias.juridicas.com/external/nj_masterunizar/lo10-1995.l2t9.html#:~:text=Art%C3%ADculo%20195.&text=El%20que%20no%20socorriere%20a,de%20tres%20a%20doce%20meses.) Given that you want this for Wikipedia, I think the best way is to cite the most reliable source.

10. Belgium. Yes on both accounts, though I don’t know the names or sections of the specific laws.

    I had a first aid course and there I learned (even though I kinda new already) people are required to help if possible. The minimum is calling the emergency number. Of course not if helping puts yourself in danger.
    And you can’t be punish for doing something wrong if you’re trying to help.

    In Dutch we have something called ‘Schuldig verzuim’ ( I don’t know the French/German terms. Where according to the Belgian law it is a crime to not help someone who is in great danger, if you could help that person without putting yourself in danger.

11. Yes.

    It is mandatory to try to your best to help anybody in lifethreatening condition. Even if you make his situation worse by inexperienced action, it’s better in the eyes of law than not helping at all.

    “Good samaritan” is called krajní nouze (borderline emergency), and it allows people to break law, even cause damage, if it’s needed to save life, or prevent bigger material damage.

12. > Good Samaritan laws protect rescuers who help a person in danger from getting sued or persecuted for wrongful death or damages.

    I didn’t see anyone referring to this

13. Yes, you can be condemned for “*non assistance à personne en danger*” (not assisting an endangered person) if you don’t help someone you know needs immediate rescuing. Up to 5 years of prison and a 75k€ fine + compensation if the victim decides to sue you.

    Of course you shouldn’t put yourself in a dangerous situation to help someone else, but you at least have to alert actual rescuers.

    https://www.service-public.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F34551?lang=en

    Edit : also, you can’t be sued for trying to help as long as what you did was “proportionate” to the danger.

14. You have a duty to help in an emergency, but how you do it is up on you but if you have for example break a law to help you don’t get punished. This goes even up to killing someone if he tries to kill someone else.

15. Yes, under Article 593 paragraph two of the Penal Code: “The same penalty (punishment with imprisonment of up to one year or a fine of up to 2,500 euros) applies to anyone who, finding a human body that is or appears to be inanimate, or a person who is injured or otherwise in danger, fails to provide the necessary assistance or to give immediate notice to the Authorities.” The same law states also that “If a personal injury results from such conduct of the offender, the penalty is increased up to a third (Article 64 of the Criminal Code); if death results, the penalty is doubled.”

    Afaik the most similar law to the “Good Samaritan Law” here is Art. 54 Penal Code that “Anyone who committed the fact because he was forced to do so by the need to save himself or others from the present danger of serious personal injury, a danger he did not voluntarily cause, nor otherwise avoidable, is not punishable, provided that the fact is proportionate to the danger.” which is supplemented by specific laws, like the recent law 1441 regarding the immunity of using AEDs.