By Kevin L. Connors, Esquire

November 19, 2014 was a very busy day for the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, as two very important decisions were issued that day.

The Decisions were Tincher v. Omega Flex, Inc., dealing with product liability cases, and Zauflik v. Pennsbury School District, dealing with governmental immunity.

The case citation for Zauflik is No. 1 MAP 2014.

Zauflik involves a highly publicized accident and trial, as the Plaintiff, represented by Thomas Kline, Esquire of Kline & Specter, known to all as a high profile catastrophic injury Plaintiff attorney, was a 14 year old Pennsbury School District student who lost a leg through amputation, when a Pennsbury School District bus accelerated out of control, careening onto a sidewalk, where it struck the Plaintiff and other students.

Filing a personal injury lawsuit against the School District in the Bucks County Court of Common Pleas, the critical issue at trial was not any issue with respect to the School District’s liability, but was, instead, whether the School District’s liability to the Plaintiff was limited to the statutory limit on damages that are recoverable against local governmental immunities under Pennsylvania’s Political Subdivisions Tort Claims Act (“PSTCA”).

To all familiar with this statute, balancing the tenacious tightrope inherent in catastrophic injury accidents against the necessity of governmental entities established to serve the public, that are without a for-profit foreskin, nevertheless does allow for certain enumerated exceptions to the statutorily-limited personal injury damages cap of $500,000.00.

One exception involves liability arising from the negligent operation of a motor vehicle. This exception is under Section 8542 of the PSTCA.

When that immunity is waived by the governmental entity, Section 8553 of the ESTCA imposes the statutory cap of $500,000.00 on the damages sought by the injured Plaintiff.

Waiving that immunity, Pennsbury sought to avoid a trial by petitioning the court to pay the statutory damages cap of $500,000.00 into the court, with the Plaintiff opposing Pennsbury’s petition, and with the Plaintiff demanding that the case proceed to trial on the sole issue of recoverable damages.

There being no issue as to Pennsbury’s admitted liability for the accident, the jury returned a verdict in favor of the Plaintiff in the amount of $14,000,000.00.

Pennsbury filed a post-trial motion to mold the trial verdict to the statutory cap of $500,000.00.

This motion was granted by the trial court, over the objection of the Plaintiff.

The Plaintiff argued that the statutory limit on damages was unconstitutional.

The court-molded verdict was then appealed by the Plaintiff to the Commonwealth Court, as appeals involving governmental entities or agencies are the exclusive province, on appeal, of the Commonwealth Court.

The Commonwealth Court affirmed the trial court’s verdict molding, finding that the statutory cap of personal injury damages was constitutional, and that it did not violate equal protection laws.

Before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, Plaintiff advanced two theories on appeal, one being that the statutory cap on damages against a governmental immunity violated equal protection laws, and was, therefore, unconstitutional, as well as arguing that the statutory cap on damages was discriminatory to tort victims, by distinguishing the status of a tortfeasor based upon the claim as either being against a public or private entity.

As tragic as the facts in Zauflik v. Pennsbury School District were, and still are, the Supreme Court in an opinion authorized by now-retired Chief Justice Castille, held that the constitutional challenges asserted by the Plaintiff required it to determine whether the Pennsylvania General Assembly had struck the appropriate balance, between the rights of tort victims versus the public interest necessitating the existence of governmental entities, with the Supreme Court holding that the policy questions raised by the tort claim asserted in Zauflik v. Pennsbury School District, was one that the General Assembly alone had the capacity to analyze, balancing the budgeting abilities of school districts and governmental agencies against the consequences of the same entities’ negligence causing personal injury.

In so holding, the Zauflik Court held that the PSTCA limitations of liability and damages was not unconstitutional, that the Pennsylvania legislature was constitutionally empowered to act as it did in enacting the PSTCA, with the Supreme Court affirming the holdings of both the Commonwealth Court and the trial court, in the course of molding the Plaintiff’s verdict to the statutory cap of $500,000.00.

The concurring opinion of Justice Baer intimated that the cap on damages might be challenged as an improper deprivation of a tort victim’s right to a jury trial, which might well be the next theatrical stage for Kline & Specter.

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Questions concerning tort and/or contract liability that might arise in the context of casualty claims can be directed to Kevin L. Connors at [email protected] (Phone: 610-524-2100 Ext. 112).