In Keech v. Berkeley Unified School Dist. (1984) 162 Cal.App.3d 464, a 16-year-old student and his mother sued the school district for failure to follow various statutory requirements regarding applications for special education services. The plaintiffs alleged, among other things, the district acted negligently in failing to comply with former section 56321, subdivision (a), which, at the time, provided: "Whenever an assessment for the development or revision of the individualized education program is to be conducted, the parent of the pupil shall be given, in writing, a proposed assessment plan within 15 days of the referral for assessment. ..." (Stats. 1982, ch. 1201, 16, p. 4354.) The plaintiffs sought an award of damages for negligence, negligent infliction of emotional distress, and tortious failure to discharge mandatory duties. (Keech, supra, 162 Cal.App.3d at p. 467.) The trial court dismissed the complaint after it sustained the defendants' demurrers with leave to amend and the plaintiffs failed to amend. (Keech, supra, 162 Cal.App.3d at pp. 466-467.) The Court of Appeal affirmed. The appellate court first rejected the plaintiffs' attempt to use the statutes as a basis for establishing a duty of care for purposes of their negligence claim. (Id. at p. 469.) It then rejected the plaintiffs' alternate theory that the statutory provisions imposed a mandatory duty and that failure to comply constituted an actionable tort under Government Code section 815.6. The court explained "Government Code section 815.6 'imposes liability for failure to discharge only such "mandatory duty" as is "imposed by an enactment that is designed to protect against the risk of a particular kind of injury." ' " (Keech, supra, 162 Cal.App.3d at p. 470.) The court indicated use of the word "shall" in the statute is not conclusive. Rather, "the controlling question is whether the enactment at issue was intended to impose an obligatory duty to take specified official action to prevent particular foreseeable injuries, thereby providing an appropriate basis for civil liability. If injury of the kind sustained by appellants was not one of the consequences which the Legislature sought to prevent through imposition of the alleged mandatory duty, liability does not obtain under Government Code section 815.6." (Ibid.) The court went on to conclude the statutes "cannot reasonably be construed as designed to 'protect' the parents of handicapped children from the 'injury' of having to pay the costs of hospitalizing a disturbed child pending assessment of the appropriate form of special education to be afforded ... ." (Id. at p. 471.)