Good Samaritan law

First Aid & CPR Florida

The Good Samaritan: compassion and protection

Drawn from the Bible (Luke 10:25-37), the parable of the Good Samaritan tells of a traveller left for dead who is rescued by a stranger that tends to him and sees to his care. Beyond its religious context, it carries a universal message: the moral duty to help others in danger, through compassion and altruism.

Inspired by this principle, many so-called Good Samaritan laws have been enacted around the world to protect those who assist in good faith during an emergency from legal action. The exact scope of that protection, however, varies from one jurisdiction to another: here is what the law applicable to your region provides.

Statute citation

Governing act Fla. Stat. § 768.13 — the Good Samaritan Act: immunity for gratuitous, good-faith emergency care.
Scope of protection Protects any person who gratuitously and in good faith renders emergency care, acting as a reasonably prudent person would under similar circumstances. No liability for damages absent such a standard.
Duty to rescue No
AED liability protection Protected
Statute Fla. Stat. § 768.1325 — the Cardiac Arrest Survival Act: immunity for AED users and for the person/entity that acquired and made the AED available.
No legal duty to rescue AED protection

Your protection under the law

Florida's Good Samaritan Act, Fla. Stat. § 768.13, protects any person who gratuitously and in good faith renders emergency care, so long as they act as a reasonably prudent person would in similar circumstances—meet that standard and there is no liability for damages. Alongside it, the Cardiac Arrest Survival Act, Fla. Stat. § 768.1325, immunizes both the AED user and the person or entity that acquired the device and made it available, so using a public defibrillator carries the same legal cover.

No duty to act, but every reason to

Florida law imposes no obligation to intervene—helping is a choice, and it remains yours. Act in good faith and the statute shields your effort, with the use of an AED expressly written into the protection. The fear of a lawsuit shouldn't outrun the instinct to help; the legislature deliberately took that risk off the board.

Why training matters

When a heart stops, survival slips away at roughly ten percent a minute, and Florida's crowded beaches, retirement communities and busy venues make sudden cardiac arrest something an ordinary person may well witness. In those first minutes the bystander is the first link in the chain of survival—the paramedics, however fast, arrive to a scene already shaped by what was or wasn't done. The law has already removed the legal risk; training removes the doubt, turning a frightened onlooker into someone whose hands know the way. Prepare today, and you may be the reason a family stays whole.