Court of Special Appeals caps liability for constitutional claims

 Proponents say cap protects local governments from going bankrupt

By Steve Lash
The Daily Record Newswire

BALTIMORE, MD — No matter how egregious a police officer’s actions are, local governments cannot be held liable to the victims of such conduct for more than $200,000 each, a Maryland appeals court held Friday.

The Court of Special Appeals said Prince George’s County owes only $400,000 of an $11.5 million jury verdict for the widow and son of Manuel Espina, who was killed by an off-duty officer in 2008.

The cap on damages in the state’s Local Government Tort Claims Act applies even to violations of a constitutional right, the intermediate appellate panel said in the first published opinion on the topic.

As a case of first impression, the issue is ripe for review by Maryland’s top court, the Court of Appeals, an attorney for the family said.

“It’s a textbook case on the question of whether serious constitutional claims will have any real viability in the state court system,” said the attorney, said the family’s attorney, Timothy F. Maloney of Joseph, Greenwald & Laake P.A. in Greenbelt. “If constitutional claims are limited to $200,000, then the doors of the state courts will be closed to significant constitutional cases.”

But Victoria M. Shearer, the county’s attorney, called the court’s decision in keeping with the goal of the LGTCA cap “to compensate insured victims while protecting local governments from being bankrupted.”

“We feel that it [the decision] properly applied the cap to state constitutional torts,” added Shearer, of Karpinski, Colaresi & Karp P.A. in Baltimore.

In its 3-0 decision, the appeals court noted the law’s cap covers “damages resulting from tortuous acts or omissions.”

“[N]othing in the legislative history suggests that the General Assembly intended to limit the application of the cap to nonconstitutional claims,” Judge Stuart R. Berger wrote for the Court of Special Appeals.

Espina was shot to death by Steven Jackson, an off-duty police officer, on Aug. 16, 2008. Espina’s wife, Estela, and his grown son, also named Manuel, filed suit against the county nearly a year later.

During a 23-day trial in early 2011, the jury heard conflicting testimony from Jackson and other witnesses.

Jackson testified that he saw Espina and another man drinking beer outside a Langley Park apartment, in a complex where Jackson worked as a part-time security guard, and followed them into the building to investigate possible violations of loitering and open container laws. Testimony at trial indicated it was Espina’s birthday.

According to Jackson, Espina became aggressive and started a struggle that his friends in the building joined, leading Jackson to draw his service revolver. Espina then removed his hands from Jackson’s baton, Jackson testified, but did not back off. The officer said he was in fear for his life when he fired the fatal shot, which struck Espina in the stomach.

Other witnesses, however, testified that Espina was unarmed and took no offensive action against Jackson, who was shouting profanities throughout the altercation, and who stopped Espina’s son from performing CPR on his dying father by having him put in handcuffs.

The jury deliberated for three days before finding the county liable for wrongful death and for violating Espina’s due process rights under Article 24 of the Maryland Constitution’s Declaration of Rights. On April 1, 2011, the jury awarded Espina’s wife and children $11,505,000. Judge Albert W. Northrop later reduced the verdict against the county to $405,000, citing the LGTCA cap and the family’s $5,000 in funeral expenses. The verdict against Jackson was not reduced.

Both sides appealed.

On Friday, the Court of Special Appeals upheld Northrop’s ruling on the cap, but noted that it applies to the total amount, not just non-economic damages. As a result, the court struck the $5,000 award for funeral expenses.

The county also argued that another statute, which caps the amount of non-economic damages in personal-injury cases, should apply to constitutional-rights violations. However, since the amount of the award under the LGTCA was less than the limit under the non-economic damages cap, the court did not need to decide that question.