Cooper v. Rodriguez

• Decision Date: 24 July 2015
• Docket Number: No. 87, Sept. Term, 2014.,87, Sept. Term, 2014.
• Citation: 443 Md. 680,118 A.3d 829
• Parties: Larry COOPER v. Melissa RODRIGUEZ, et al.
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

443 Md. 680
118 A.3d 829

Larry COOPER
v.
Melissa RODRIGUEZ, et al.

No. 87, Sept. Term, 2014.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

July 24, 2015.

118 A.3d 832

Julia Doyle Bernhardt, Asst. Atty. Gen. (Brian E. Frosh, Atty. Gen. of Maryland, Baltimore), on brief, for Petitioner.

Cary J. Hansel (Matthew D. Ling, Hansel Law, PC, Baltimore; Michael A. Mastracci, Law Office of Michael A. Mastracci, LLC, Baltimore; Samuel M. Shapiro, Samuel M. Shapiro, P.A., Rockville), on brief, for Respondents.

Argued before: BARBERA, C.J., HARRELL,^* BATTAGLIA, GREENE, ADKINS, McDONALD and WATTS, JJ.

Opinion

WATTS, J.

443 Md. 686

Gross negligence has been defined as, among things, “an intentional failure to perform a manifest duty in reckless disregard of the consequences as affecting the life or property of another, and also implies

118 A.3d 833

a thoughtless disregard of the consequences without the exertion of any effort to avoid them.” Barbre v. Pope, 402 Md. 157, 187, 935 A.2d 699, 717 (2007) (citations omitted). This case concerns the brutal murder of an inmate by another inmate during a ride on a prison transport bus that was staffed by five correctional officers. At core, the issue is whether the correctional officer who was in charge of the bus was grossly negligent and, if so, whether he is entitled to common law public official immunity.

We hold that: (I) the trial court erred in striking the jury's finding of gross negligence by the correctional officer and in concluding that the correctional officer was entitled to immunity under the Maryland Tort Claims Act (“the MTCA”), Md. Code Ann., State Gov't (1984, 2014 Repl. Vol.) (“SG”) § 12–101 to 12–110 ; and (II) the correctional officer was not entitled to common law public official immunity, not because the correctional officer owed a duty arising out of a special relationship with the inmates in his custody, but instead because entitlement to common law public official immunity is limited by gross negligence; i.e., gross negligence is an exception to common law public official immunity. Thus, here, having acted with gross negligence, the correctional officer is not

443 Md. 687

entitled to immunity under the MTCA or common law public official immunity.

BACKGROUND

In the early morning hours of February 2, 2005, inmate Kevin G. Johns, Jr. (“Johns”) murdered fellow inmate Philip E. Parker, Jr. (“Parker”), in plain sight of other inmates and correctional officers, while the two were traveling together on a prison transport bus with thirty-four other inmates and five correctional officers.

The Lawsuit

On May 15, 2006, in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City (“the circuit court”), Melissa Rodriguez and Philip E. Parker, Sr., Parker's parents (together, “Respondents”) sued: the State of Maryland; the Secretary of the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services (“DPSCS”); the Commissioner of the Division of Correction; the Warden of the Maryland Correctional Adjustment Center (“Supermax”);¹ and the five individual correctional officers who staffed the prison transport bus on February 2, 2005—Larry Cooper (“Cooper”), Petitioner, Robert Scott (“Scott”), Kenyatta Surgeon (“Surgeon”), Earl Generette (“Generette”), and Charles Gaither (“Gaither”). The complaint contained six counts: (1) a claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for violating Parker's rights under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution; (2) a claim for violating Parker's rights under Articles 24 and 26 of the Maryland Declaration of Rights; (3) wrongful death; (4) survival action; (5) assault and battery against the five individual

443 Md. 688

correctional officers concerning their actions after the prison transport bus arrived back at Supermax; and (6) funeral expenses.²

118 A.3d 834

On October 11–14, 17–21, and 24, 2011, the circuit court conducted a jury trial. At trial, evidence of the following facts was adduced.

Initial Transport and Johns's Sentencing

Before murdering Parker, Johns had been convicted of murdering his uncle;³ sentenced to life imprisonment, with all but thirty-five years suspended; and sent to the Maryland Correctional Institution in Hagerstown, Maryland (“Hagerstown Correctional Institution”). Later, while incarcerated at Hagerstown Correctional Institution, Johns murdered a cellmate,⁴ and was transferred from Hagerstown Correctional Institution to Supermax. On February 1, 2005, four inmates who were incarcerated at Supermax—including Parker, Johns, Bradford Diggs (“Diggs”), and James Folk (“Folk”)—were transported by bus to the Circuit Court for Washington County to participate in the hearing on Johns's sentencing. Parker, Diggs, and Folk testified on Johns's behalf. At the sentencing hearing, Parker testified that Johns was “paranoid[,]” had “a really, really short temper,” and became “very easily irritated and agitated [.]” The Circuit Court for Washington County sentenced Johns to life imprisonment, without the possibility of parole.

443 Md. 689

Two guards from Hagerstown Correctional Institution, Bradley Hott (“Hott”) and Hunter Vest (“Vest”), submitted reports in connection with an internal investigation conducted after Parker was murdered, detailing Johns's conduct before, during, and after the sentencing hearing. Hott and Vest had transported the four Supermax inmates between Hagerstown Correctional Institution and the Circuit Court for Washington County for Johns's sentencing hearing. According to Hott, after being sentenced, Johns “began to laugh [,]” and later commented that “the killing had just begun.” According to Vest, upon being sentenced, Johns said: “ ‘Gonna be trouble when I get back to Baltimore. They think it[’]s bad now, the killing has just begun. I'll be back in court for these charges the rest of my life. They will have to put me to death to end this.' ” Prior to Parker's murder, neither Hott nor Vest reported Johns's comments to their supervisor because both believed that such comments were not “uncommon for an inmate in [Johns's] situation.” Nor were Johns's comments reported to the transportation team from Baltimore when it arrived to transport the Supermax inmates back to Baltimore.

The Bus and Transport back to Supermax

After Johns's sentencing, Johns, Parker, Folk, and Diggs were transported to the Hagerstown Correctional Institution to await transport to Supermax on the Maryland Reception, Diagnostic and Classification Center (“MRDCC”)'s Central Transportation Unit Bus # 2809 (“the bus”). The bus was a “relatively new” Bluebird bus, modified to be a “mobile prison” for the transport of prisoners. The bus consisted of three locked compartments that

118 A.3d 835

were separated by steel grillwork and Plexiglas. Three secured passenger sections were in the middle of the bus. In the front and rear of the bus, there were two securable officer compartments. At the front of the bus, there were three seats—one for the driver, an adjacent front passenger seat, and one seat behind the driver's seat. Behind those three seats were two protective custody cages, one directly behind the driver and one directly across the aisle from the driver's side cage behind the front passenger seat.

443 Md. 690

At the rear of the bus, directly behind the last secured passenger section, there was an elevated cage containing two seats for officers, to permit a good view of the interior of the bus. The elevated cage was separated from the passenger section by Plexiglas and wire mesh caging, which was porous to permit sight and sound. The two officer compartments were separated from the passenger compartment by padlocked doors; the locks on the compartments were designed so that officers in the rear elevated cage could enter the passenger compartment during an emergency.

The bus was staffed by five correctional officers. Cooper was the Officer in Charge. Gaither was the driver. Surgeon and Generette sat in the front of the bus. Scott and Cooper sat in the rear elevated cage, approximately seven and one-quarter feet from Parker, who was sitting next to the window in the second-to-last bench in front of the elevated cage. As the Officer in Charge, Cooper was required to sit at the front of the bus and was disallowed from being the bus driver; Cooper later stated that he “never knew” that, as the Officer in Charge, he was required to ride in the front of the bus. Under a Division of Correction policy concerning “Post Orders: Escort and Transportation Procedures”—applicable to MRDCC, the post to which the five correctional officers were assigned—the correctional officers were to be “alert and observant at all times” and to “display initiative [and] good judgment[.]” And, under a Division of Correction...