Saltalamachia Torts Section 6A 2010

Here are some interesting background facts on the Tarasoff case.

The Tarasoff case is perhaps inextricably linked to Berkeley in the 1960’s, and life around the University of California campus. The campus was justifiably famous for being a world-class intellectual center and was attracting students from all over the globe. Tatiana Tarasoff and Prosenjit Poddar were two such students. She was born of Russian parents who had emigrated to Brazil, while he was from a small Bengali village and was a member of an “untouchable” caste. He came to Berkeley to study naval architecture, having always attended schools where no dating or other social interchange between the sexes was permitted. The freewheeling atmosphere that prevailed in Berkeley at that time must have been totally alien to him.

They met at a dance at the International House, and he was apparently immediately smitten. She was friendly with him, but they were never actually romantically involved. When he found out that she was romantically involved with other men, his obsession and jealosy grew. He told friends and coworkers of his desire to kill Tatiana. It was at this time that he started seeing a psychiatrist at Cowell Hospital, the UC medical center.

Strangely enough Poddar had developed a friendship of sorts with Tatiana’s brother, who was knew of Poddar’s obsession, and may have had some sense of the danger, although he testified that he never believed that Poddar would kill his sister. The two young men were even rooming together at the time of the killing, the brother having told Poddar where Tatiana was on the day she was killed. Poddar went to her house, they argued, he shot her with a pellet gun and then stabbed her 17 times with a kitchen knife.

Adapted from Shuck and Givilber, Torts Stories, Foundation Press 2003