To use or attempt to use or offer to use force upon or toward the person of another is not unlawful if committed by a parent or the authorized agent of any parent, or by any guardian, teacher, or other school official, in the exercise of a lawful authority to restrain or correct the child, pupil, or ward and if restraint or correction has been rendered necessary by the misconduct of the child, pupil, or ward, or by the child's refusal to obey the lawful command of such parent, or authorized agent, guardian, teacher, or other school official, and the force used is reasonable in manner and moderate in degree.
S.D. Codified Laws § 22-18-5
Reasonable force used by parent, guardian, or teacher in correcting child, pupil, or ward
Applied in 13 court decisions — leading case State v. Wright (1999)
Most recently applied in Graff v. Children's Care Hospital and School (May 2020)
Source: SDC 1939, § 13.2402 (4); SL 1976, ch 158, § 18-3; SL 1977, ch 189, § 48; SL 1990, ch 128, § 2; SL 2005, ch 120, § 9.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: South Dakota Legislature. Reproduced from public-domain South Dakota statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.