Cox v. State

• Decision Date: 24 July 1992
• Citation: 844 S.W.2d 173
• Parties: Tammy and Clarence COX, Claimants-Appellants, v. STATE of Tennessee, Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: Tennessee Court of Appeals

Page 173

844 S.W.2d 173

Tammy and Clarence COX, Claimants-Appellants, v. STATE of Tennessee, Defendant-Appellee.

Court of Appeals of Tennessee Western Section, at Jackson.

July 24, 1992.

Application for Permission to Appeal

Denied by Supreme Court

Oct. 26, 1992.

Asa Hoke, Memphis, for claimants/appellants.

Charles W. Burson, Atty. Gen. and Reporter and Charles Everett Robinson, Asst. Atty. Gen., for defendant/appellee.

FARMER, Judge.

Claimant ¹ appeals from the order of the Tennessee Claims Commission dismissing her claim against the State of Tennessee.

The facts are largely undisputed. In November 1983 the Memphis Community Service Center (hereinafter "Work Release Center") sent a group of inmates, including Kent Ousley, to a work release assignment at the City Roofing Company on Raines Road in Memphis, Tennessee. Although the group of inmates included both violent and nonviolent criminals, prior to November 1983 Ousley had never been charged with or convicted of a violent crime.

A Work Release Center van delivered the inmates to their work assignment. Under Work Release Center policy, and in accordance with the Center's agreement with City Roofing, at the end of the work day, or if no work was available that day, the inmates were required to wait at City Roofing until the Work Release Center van picked them up. The agreement with City Roofing specified that the Work Release Center van would pick up the inmates promptly at the end of the work day or promptly after being called by City Roofing if the work day ended early.

Despite the Center's policy and its agreement with City Roofing, the van often did not arrive until several hours after being called to pick up inmates. If the Work Release Center received a call to pick up inmates while the van was transporting another group of inmates, the van would first return to the Work Release Center with its current load of inmates before picking up the second group. City Roofing had spoken to personnel at the Center about the Center's failure to promptly pick up inmates, but the problem persisted.

On the morning of November 11, 1983, City Roofing notified the inmates, including Ousley, about midway through the morning that the work day had been cancelled due to rain and that the inmates were being released from work. City Roofing then called the Center to pick up the inmates. The van, however, did not arrive at City Roofing to pick up the inmates until several hours later.

At approximately 1:30 that afternoon, Ousley attacked Claimant in a parking lot near the Criminal Justice Center in downtown Memphis. Ousley forced Claimant into her car and began to drive around the city, continuously beating Claimant and threatening to kill her if she did not shut up. Ousley stopped at several locations throughout the city where he repeatedly raped and sodomized Claimant. As a result of the attacks, Claimant suffered severe physical, emotional, and mental injuries.

On appeal Claimant presents the following issues for review:

I. Did the Commissioner err in finding that [the State] did not owe a duty to [Claimant] concerning the supervision and control of the inmates in the work release program and the prevention of escape of the prisoners?

II. Did the Commissioner err in finding that it was not foreseeable that [Claimant's] injury could occur if the inmates were not adequately supervised and controlled resulting in an inmate escaping?

III. Did the Commissioner err in disallowing as evidence the memorandum written by the Captain of Security for the [W]ork [R]elease [C]enter?

The Public Duty Doctrine

In dismissing the claim, the Commissioner found that "the duties of the State in providing public services is [sic] to the public at large and the State cannot be liable to a particular individual unless there is a special relationship between the State and that individual and no such relationship has been shown in this claim."

Under the so-called public duty doctrine, as it exists in Tennessee, "private citizens, as such, cannot maintain an action complaining of the wrongful acts of public officials unless such private citizens aver special interest or a special injury not common to the public generally." Bennett v. Stutts, 521 S.W.2d 575, 576 (Tenn.1975). Recognizing that the law in Tennessee comports with the overwhelming majority of jurisdictions, the Supreme Court has stated the law as follows:

Public wrongs or neglect or breach of public duty generally cannot be redressed at a suit in the name of an individual or individuals whose interest in the right asserted does not differ from that of the public generally, or who suffers injury only in common with the public generally, and not peculiar to himself, even, it seems, though his loss is greater in degree, unless such right of action is given by statute.

Bennett, 521 S.W.2d at 577 (quoting 59 Am.Jur.2d Parties § 30 (emphasis added)).

In Bennett v. Stutts, supra, the Supreme Court held that eighteen citizens, residents, and taxpayers of Dyer County, Tennessee, lacked standing to bring an action which sought to invalidate the election of the County Superintendent of Public Instruction. Similarly, in Sachs v. Shelby County Election Commission, 525 S.W.2d 672 (Tenn.1975), the Court held that a private citizen, in his capacity as a resident and registered voter, did not have standing to sue the election commission in order to challenge the sufficiency of a candidate's qualifying petition. Thus, the public duty doctrine, as applied by the Tennessee courts, has evolved largely as a rule of standing under which private citizens may not sue in their own right to vindicate public wrongs.

The public duty doctrine has also been asserted by public officials to shield them from liability in negligence actions. In Cary v. Brown, 3 Tenn.Civ.App. (Higgins) 399 (1912), the plaintiff brought suit against the commissioners of public roads of Hamilton County for injuries received as a result of the commissioners' failure to keep in repair a bridge on a public highway. In affirming the circuit court's judgment directing a verdict in favor of the commissioners, the court stated:

At common law we are of the opinion there is no liability in this case. The common law rule seems to be that a private person can recover damages from an officer only when he can show special damage to himself, which must be the legal and natural consequences of the wrong act. Butler v. Kent, 19 Johns (New York), 223; State v. Ruth, 9 S.Dakota, 84 .

Where the breach of duty is one which the officer owes to the public alone, there can be no recovery at the suit of a private individual, although special injury thereby may result to him. School District Etc. v. Burress, 89 N.W.Rep., 609.

3 Tenn.Civ.App. (Higgins) at 401.

Under T.C.A. § 9-8-307(d), in an action before the Claims Commission, the State "may assert any and all defenses, including common law defenses, which would have been available to the officer or employee in an action against such an individual based upon the same occurrence." The State argued, and apparently the Commissioner agreed, that the public duty doctrine established a common law defense for the State in that, under the doctrine, any duty owed by the State was to the public in general and not to Claimant as a private individual.

We disagree with this conclusion. The public duty doctrine does not apply where a private right of action is given by statute. Bennett, 521 S.W.2d at 577. Therefore, we believe the real question here to be whether the Tennessee Claims Commission Act, T.C.A. § 9-8-301 et seq., by its own terms authorizes the present lawsuit by Claimant. If the Act does authorize such a claim, then the public duty doctrine has no applicability to this case, either as a rule of standing or as a common law defense to negligence.

In Sweeney v. State, 768 S.W.2d 253 (Tenn.1989), the claimant brought a cause of action against the State of Tennessee based upon T.C.A. § 9-8-307(a)(1)(J). As pertinent, that section gives the Claims Commission exclusive jurisdiction to hear and determine all monetary claims against the State of Tennessee for "[d]angerous conditions on state maintained highways." T.C.A. § 9-8-307(a)(1)(J). The Supreme Court held, inter alia, that T.C.A. § 9-8-307(a)(1)(J) authorized the claimant to recover damages she sustained while riding as a passenger in an automobile that was wrecked at a dangerous curve on a State maintained highway in Franklin County, Tennessee.

We conclude that, similarly, T.C.A. § 9-8-307(a)(1)(E) authorizes the present Claimant to recover against the State for damages she sustained as a result of the State's "[n]egligent care, custody and control of persons." We further conclude that this section imposes a duty upon the State independent of other statutes cited by the parties relative to the duties of State and county workhouses to prevent the escape of prisoners (see T.C.A. §§ 41-1-702(c), 41-2-109(2)). Sweeney, 768 S.W.2d at 255.

We additionally reject the State's argument that T.C.A. § 9-8-307(a)(1)(E) creates a cause of action only on behalf of those in the care, custody and control of the State. By its own terms, the statute authorizes the Claims Commission to determine all monetary claims arising from the negligent care, custody and control of persons. The statute does not limit recovery to persons who suffer injury while in the care, custody and control of the State. In Learue ex rel. Learue v. State, 757 S.W.2d 3 (Tenn.App.1987), which the State cited in support of its position, this Court held that T.C.A. § 9-8-307(a)(1)(E) did not apply to persons paying entrance fees to State maintained recreation facilities. 757 S.W.2d at 5. While the Court determined that T.C.A. § 9-8-307(a)(1)(E) pertained to persons confined to State facilities, the Court did not purport to restrict claims brought under T.C.A. § 9-8-307(a)(1)(E) to those brought by such confined persons.

T.C.A. § 9-8-307...