Adamson v. Correctional Medical

• Decision Date: 14 June 2000
• Docket Number: No. 78,78
• Citation: 753 A.2d 501,359 Md. 238
• Parties: Eddie ADAMSON v. CORRECTIONAL MEDICAL SERVICES, INC.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

753 A.2d 501

359 Md. 238

Eddie ADAMSON v. CORRECTIONAL MEDICAL SERVICES, INC.

No. 78, Sept. Term, 1999.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

June 14, 2000.

Stephen Z. Meehan, Principal Counsel (David C. Wright, Executive Director, Joseph B. Tetrault, Chief Staff Attorney, Prisoner Rights Information System of Maryland, Inc., on brief), Chestertown, for petitioner.

John A. Bourgeois (Philip M. Andrews of Kramon & Graham, P.A., on brief), Baltimore, for respondent.

Argued before BELL, C.J., and ELDRIDGE, RODOWSKY, RAKER, WILNER, CATHELL, and HARREL, JJ HARRELL, Judge.

Mr. Eddie Adamson, Petitioner, is an inmate in the custody of the Maryland Division of Correction ("DOC") of the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services ("the Department") and housed at the Maryland House of Correction in Jessup. On 15 July 1998, he filed suit in the District Court of Maryland sitting in Anne Arundel County against Correctional Medical Services, Inc., Respondent, a private medical provider under contract¹ with the State of Maryland to provide such services to prisoners at the Maryland House of Correction. Petitioner alleged breach of contract and negligence with regard to inadequate medical services and claimed $2,500 in damages. The District Court dismissed the suit holding that Petitioner first had not exhausted administrative remedies mandated by the Prisoner Ligation Act (PLA), Maryland Code (1974, 1998 Repl.Vol., 1999 Supp.), Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article, § 5-1001, et seq.. Petitioner appealed to the Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County. The Circuit Court, also relying on the PLA, granted Respondent's motion to dismiss the appeal.² We granted certiorari to consider the following question:

Does the Prisoner Litigation Act, Maryland Code (1974, 1998 Repl.Vol.), Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article, § 5-1001, et seq., require that a prisoner exhaust administrative remedies prior to instituting suit in state court against a private corporation that is contracted to provide medical care to prisoners in the custody of the Division of Correction?

We answer in the negative and reverse.

I.

Petitioner alleged as follows in his pro se complaint in the District Court:

Both named defendants³ at the times relevant to the plaintiffs [sic] claim were under contract with the Maryland Division of Correction to provide comprhensive [sic] health care to Maryland State Inmates as he [sic] plaintiff duly being []3rd[] party beneficiary. From August 29, 1996 until the present time both named defendants in the scope of their offices as Health Care providers have recklessly and negligencly [sic] failed to provide adequate medical care for Plaintiff's painful Anterior crucrate [sic] ligarment [sic] repair of his right knee causing continued pain and suffering after the plaintiff has relentlessly saught [sic] adequate medical care to no avail[.]

On the complaint form, the boxes labeled "contract" and "tort" are checked signaling that Petitioner alleged breach of contract and negligence against Respondent.⁴ Petitioner claimed damages in the amount of $2,500. The District Court dismissed Petitioner's complaint on the ground that Petitioner had not exhausted first available administrative remedies before seeking judicial relief, as required by the PLA.

Petitioner, still pro se, appealed to the Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County. At the hearing in that court on Respondent's motion to dismiss the appeal, the parties presented a number of documents, including DOC Directives relating its Administrative Review Procedure (ARP) for inmate grievances and correspondence from the Department's Inmate Grievance Office (IGO), a separate agency within the Department, and the State Attorney General's Office. The correspondence emanated from cases unrelated to the present one, but nonetheless were used and relied on by both parties, without objection, to argue for their respective interpretations of the PLA exhaustion requirement. Two letters were authored by the Executive Director of the IGO. One letter, pre-dating the PLA's enactment, was dated 16 July 1992, and the other was dated 20 November 1998. Both IGO letters, addressed to prisoners that apparently had inquired about the proper procedures for filing claims against private contractors similar to Respondent, indicated the IGO would not entertain such complaints. A third letter, dated 27 January 1999, originated from the Office of the State Attorney General. The letter, signed by an Assistant Attorney General, was in response to a request from a judge of the District Court apparently seeking clarification of DOC Directive 185-002, Section IV.C.2 (addressing the ARP), in a different case pending before the District Court of Maryland sitting in Anne Arundel County.⁵ The author opined that the DOC's ARP procedure was not available to an inmate asserting negligence against a private medical contractor.

Respondent argued that Petitioner's claim must undergo at least the DOC and perhaps the IGO administrative gauntlet, pursuant to PLA § 5-1001, et seq., before filing a civil action against Respondent in the District or Circuit Court. The court agreed with Respondent and found that Petitioner had "failed to provide proof that he exhausted the Administrative Remedy Procedure or that, in fact, he exhausted the remedy." The court cited to PLA § 5-1003, et seq., to support its decision.⁶

II.

In reviewing the underlying grant of a motion to dismiss, we must assume the truth of the well-pleaded factual allegations of the complaint, including the reasonable inferences that may be drawn from those allegations. Allied Inv. Corp. v. Jasen, 354 Md. 547, 555, 731 A.2d 957, 961 (1999); Stone v. Chicago Title Ins. Co. of Maryland, 330 Md. 329, 333, 624 A.2d 496, 498 (1993); Tafflin v. Levitt, 92 Md.App. 375, 379, 608 A.2d 817, 819 (1992). We have noted that "the facts comprising the cause of action must be pleaded with sufficient specificity. Bald assertions and conclusory statements by the pleader will not suffice." Bobo v. State, 346 Md. 706, 708-09, 697 A.2d 1371, 1372 (1997) (citations omitted). In the end, "[d]ismissal is proper only if the alleged facts and permissible inferences, so viewed, would, if proven, nonetheless fail to afford relief to the plaintiff." Bobo, 346 Md. at 709, 697 A.2d at 1373. See also Allied Inv. Corp., 354 Md. at 555, 731 A.2d at 961. In sum, because we must deem the facts to be true, our task is confined to determining whether the trial court was legally correct in its decision to dismiss. See Allied Inv. Corp., 354 Md. at 555, 731 A.2d at 961; Bobo, 346 Md. at 709, 697 A.2d at 1373. With the appellate review standard in mind, we consider the legal issue in this case.

Petitioner, acquiring legal representation following the Circuit Court's ruling, now argues more pointedly that the PLA's administrative exhaustion requirement does not apply to prisoner malpractice claims against private medical providers under contract with the State. He asserts that the PLA process was designed only to apply to prisoner grievances regarding conditions of confinement against the State of Maryland, the DOC, and its officials and employees. Petitioner reasons that the purpose of the statute was threefold: to weed out frivolous claims against the State, to conserve judicial resources, and to relieve the burden on the Attorney General of defending an influx of lawsuits filed in state courts following passage of the federal analog to the PLA. He contends that the complaint filed in the District Court does not relate to conditions of his confinement, but rather to an injury (past and ongoing pain and suffering) inflicted by medical treatment or the lack thereof attributable to Respondent. Furthermore, he argues, the PLA was not designed to be used by private contractors as a screening device for prisoner complaints because the available administrative procedures are not equipped to deal with malpractice claims, nor do any such procedures empower the DOC to provide Petitioner with any remedy in the nature of damages. Respondent presents essentially two arguments why Petitioner must exhaust available administrative remedies before filing a civil action in state court. First, Respondent states that under the principles of statutory construction, coupled with the specific legislative history of the statute involved, the PLA's administrative exhaustion requirement plainly encompasses prisoner malpractice lawsuits filed against private contractors. Respondent focuses in particular on the defined statutory term "civil action," stating:

Four elements comprise the principal definition of "civil action" under the Act. To be a "civil action," an action must be: (1) a legal action (2) seeking money damages, injunctive relief, or any appeal (3) filed in any court in the State (4) that relates to or involves a prisoner's conditions of confinement. See § 5-1001(c)(1). Petitioner's actions against [Respondent] in the district court and the circuit court satisfy each of those elements. Petitioner filed his lawsuit against [Respondent] in the district court, then appealed to the circuit court, alleging that [Respondent] "recklessly and negligencly [sic] failed to provide adequate medical care for the Plaintiff's painful Anterior crucrate ligarment [sic] repair of his right knee...." Plaintiff sought damages of $2,500.00. Certainly this case is a legal action, seeking money damages, filed in a court in this State.

A crux of Respondent's argument lies in its conception of the statutory term "conditions of confinement." It asserts that Petitioner's malpractice claim relates to a "condition of confinement" by referencing Supreme Court jurisprudence and several federal court decisions. It states:

In Wilson v. Seiter, 501 U.S. 294 [111 S.Ct. 2321, 115 L.Ed.2d 271] (1991), for example, the Court held that claims arising from prison-wide deprivations, and deprivation of medical care to an

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