deLeon v. Slear
| Decision Date | 01 September 1990 |
| Docket Number | No. 122,122 |
| Citation | 328 Md. 569,616 A.2d 380 |
| Parties | Jose S. DELEON et ux. v. Elaine SLEAR et al. , |
| Court | Maryland Court of Appeals |
Howard J. Schulman, Baltimore, for petitioners/cross-respondents.
Catherine A. Potthast (John G. Prendergast, Jr., Smith Somerville & Case, all on brief), Baltimore, for respondents/cross-petitioners.
Argued before MURPHY, C.J., and ELDRIDGE, RODOWSKY, McAULIFFE, CHASANOW and KARWACKI, JJ.
In this case we shall hold that the doctrine of res judicata generally applies to bar a plaintiff from suing employees for defamation occurring within the scope of employment, when that plaintiff has already unsuccessfully sued their employer for defamation, and when the alleged defamatory statements in both cases were part of the same transaction or transactions.
Dr. Jose deLeon is a surgeon who was employed by St. Joseph's Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. Dr. deLeon came to the hospital in July 1980 as a third year resident after failing to be reappointed to residency programs at two other hospitals.
Between January 1983 and June 1983, during Dr. deLeon's period of residency, Elaine Slear, C.R.N.P., relayed complaints about Dr. deLeon's work to Dr. William L. Macon, IV, Chief of Surgery at the hospital. Nurse Slear was the supervising nurse practitioner at the hospital, and it was her duty to act as the liaison between the nurse practitioners and Dr. Macon. Nurse Slear told Dr. Macon that other hospital physicians had asked that Dr. deLeon not be called to see their patients, that Dr. deLeon had failed to respond to an emergency call, and that Dr. deLeon was late for his scheduled surgeries causing patients to be anesthetized for unnecessarily long times. 1
Beginning July 1, 1983, the hospital hired Dr. deLeon as a "house surgeon" on a contractual basis. As a house surgeon, he was permitted to see only hospital patients under the supervision of other physicians. In January 1984, Dr. deLeon applied for medical staff privileges which would allow him to admit his own patients and practice independently at the hospital. At the same time, he signed a release which read in pertinent part as follows:
Meanwhile, Dr. Macon continued to receive complaints about Dr. deLeon's work. On December 27, 1983, Dr. Macon telephoned Dr. deLeon and informed him that there had been a complaint by a nurse practitioner that he had refused to respond to a call to see a patient. Dr. Macon wrote a memorandum about the call. In the memorandum, Dr. Macon also noted a complaint that the nurse practitioners had tried, for forty-five minutes, to find Dr. deLeon to see a patient, and that when they finally found him, he was addressing Christmas cards.
On March 27, 1984, Dr. Macon wrote a letter to Dr. deLeon confirming a telephone call in which Dr. Macon had informed Dr. deLeon of other complaints regarding his unavailability. In the letter, Dr. Macon recounted an incident in which Dr. deLeon allegedly was called to come to the hospital when he was "on call" and did not come, and an incident in which Dr. deLeon was unavailable to the members of the operating room staff so that they were unable to schedule Dr. deLeon's cases in advance. On April 3, 1984, Dr. Macon wrote another letter to Dr. deLeon, discussing more complaints about his unavailability.
Notwithstanding these complaints, in July 1984, the hospital rehired Dr. deLeon as a house surgeon for another one-year term, while it investigated his credentials as part of his application for medical staff privileges. In the course of the investigation, the hospital asked physicians familiar with Dr. deLeon's work to comment on his abilities. Dr. Macon, as head of surgery, was also asked to comment. Dr. Macon submitted a letter in which he referred to the complaints he had received and reviewed Dr. deLeon's credentials. He concluded that Dr. deLeon's credentials were unsatisfactory and recommended that the application for privileges be denied.
On July 16, 1984, the Credentials Committee met, considered Dr. deLeon's application, and recommended that the application be denied. This recommendation was forwarded to the hospital's Medical Executive Committee, then to the Board of Trustees' Medical Staff Privileging Committee, and then to the full Board of Trustees. Each of these bodies independently reviewed Dr. deLeon's credentials, concluded that they were unsatisfactory, and each in turn voted to deny Dr. deLeon's application. Dr. deLeon was officially informed of the decision to deny his application for privileges on October 17, 1984. Dr. deLeon appealed the Board's decision through the hospital's review process.
Dr. deLeon remained at the hospital as a house surgeon pending his appeal. Complaints about his work continued. On May 3, 1985, Head Nurse Randy Broussard, R.N., wrote a memorandum to Dr. Macon, describing an incident in which an ophthalmology patient According to the memorandum, a nurse called Dr. deLeon to see the patient, but Dr. deLeon refused. The memorandum stated that Dr. deLeon claimed that he, as a house surgeon, did not see ophthalmology patients. It was, however, hospital policy that house surgeons are responsible for the coverage of ophthalmology patients. Nurse Broussard's memorandum pointed out that the patient died within a few days after this incident. Dr. Macon wrote a letter to Dr. deLeon informing him of this complaint.
An Ad Hoc Committee of the Board of Trustees was formed to hear Dr. deLeon's appeal. It held a hearing on August 27, 1985, but was unable to reach a decision. A second Ad Hoc Committee was formed, which held its hearings on December 16 and 19, 1985. On February 12, 1986, the Second Ad Hoc Committee issued a report recommending that Dr. deLeon's application be denied. Dr. deLeon then submitted a supplemental written argument to the full board. The board again voted to deny Dr. deLeon's application on May 22, 1985.
That same day Dr. deLeon and his wife, who are citizens of the Philippines, filed a diversity action in the United States District Court for the District of Maryland against the hospital and Dr. Macon. 2 Dr. deLeon sought compensatory and punitive damages based on, inter alia, alleged defamation. Nurses Slear and Broussard were not named as defendants in this action. In count one of the amended federal complaint, Dr. deLeon set forth his basic factual allegations which were, inter alia, that the hospital's " ostensible bases for [the] denial of privileges were that Dr. deLeon did not have satisfactory knowledge, judgment and clinical skills for the independent practice of surgery and had been incompetent during the course of his residency training and house staff appointment." It was alleged that the information offered in support of these conclusions was "supplied and procured by Dr. Macon and was false, unsubstantiated and distorted."
Count four of the federal complaint, asserting defamation by Dr. Macon, alleged in part that the "specific information imparted by Defendant Dr. Macon, to the effect that Plaintiff ... had been incompetent during the course of his residency training and house staff appointment, was knowingly false or made in reckless disregard of the truth thereof...."
Dr. Macon, first in his answer to interrogatories filed on December 5, 1986, and then in a deposition in the federal action, identified Nurse Slear as the probable source of the majority of the complaints about Dr. deLeon. Dr. deLeon claims, however, that he did not learn the source of the complaints until July 1987, when he deposed Nurse Slear in the federal litigation. Dr. deLeon also took the deposition of Nurse Broussard in connection with the federal suit.
The United States District Court granted the defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment on all counts, holding in an unreported opinion that there were several alternate grounds which required judgment for the defendants. Chief Judge Harvey, for the United States District Court, held that the release barred all of the claims against both the hospital and its employee Dr. Macon, that the defamation claims against the hospital and Dr. Macon were barred because "none of the statements relied upon have been published to a legally distinct third party," that Dr. Macon's statements were privileged under Maryland law and there was no showing of actual malice to overcome the privilege, and that none of the statements were defamatory.
The judgment of the United States District Court was affirmed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth...
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