Engstrom v. State

• Decision Date: 19 September 1990
• Docket Number: No. 89-1288,89-1288
• Citation: 461 N.W.2d 309
• Parties: Howard ENGSTROM, Dorothy Engstrom, and Michael Engstrom, a Minor Child, by His Mother and Next Friend, Dorothy Engstrom, Appellants, v. STATE of Iowa, Joyce Richardson, Margaret Morgan, Anthony Balik, Theresa McCoy, and Dan Ciha, Appellees.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Page 309

461 N.W.2d 309

8 A.L.R.5th 1077

Howard ENGSTROM, Dorothy Engstrom, and Michael Engstrom, a Minor Child, by His Mother and Next Friend, Dorothy Engstrom, Appellants, v. STATE of Iowa, Joyce Richardson, Margaret Morgan, Anthony Balik, Theresa McCoy, and Dan Ciha, Appellees.

No. 89-1288.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Sept. 19, 1990.

Rehearing Denied Oct. 17, 1990.

John C. Barrett and Emil Trott, Jr. of Barrett & Trott, Des Moines, for appellants.

Thomas J. Miller, Atty. Gen., and Joanne Moeller, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellees.

Considered by McGIVERIN, C.J., and HARRIS, LARSON, SCHULTZ and CARTER, JJ.

SCHULTZ, Justice.

This litigation was commenced by a married couple, Howard and Dorothy Engstrom, and their minor son, Michael Engstrom, against the State of Iowa and five state-employed social workers. Plaintiffs allege several theories of recovery precipitated by the Iowa Department of Human Services' placement of a ten-year-old child, Melody Ehmke, in their home for purposes of an adoption that later failed. The district court sustained defendants' motion for summary judgment and dismissed the case. We affirm.

Melody was born in California on July 28, 1974, to Denise and Michael Ehmke. The parents later separated, and Denise began a relationship with Terry Dochterman, a native of Iowa. Dochterman, Denise, and Melody moved to Iowa when Melody was three or four years old.

When Denise was an inmate at the woman's reformatory in 1980, the department commenced a child in need of assistance action in juvenile court. The petition indicated that the father was deceased. Following a hearing, the juvenile court granted the petition and custody of Melody was transferred to the Department of Human Services (department).

In March 1984 the juvenile court terminated Denise Ehmke's parental rights. At the termination hearing, a social worker testified that the files indicated the father was dead and that the child was adoptable.

Michael was not dead and was living in California. Denise and Dochterman gave the social workers information concerning Michael's death. Departmental files indicated that the social workers assigned to Melody's case had doubts about this information but did nothing to ascertain and verify the status or whereabouts of Melody's father. Locating Michael would not have been difficult. In 1979 when Denise applied for welfare benefits, the department's Child Support Recovery Unit located Michael in California at the permanent address of his parents. This information was never provided to the social workers assigned to Melody's case.

After the termination proceeding in 1984, Melody was prepared for adoption. Howard and Dorothy Engstrom had been accepted as potential adoptive parents and the department placed Melody with the Engstroms in November 1984. At that time the department informed the Engstroms that the parental rights of Melody's mother had been terminated and that Melody's father was deceased.

In February 1985 Michael appeared in Iowa requesting custody of his daughter. The State then attempted to terminate Michael Ehmke's parental rights. The juvenile court denied this request and initiated a plan to reunite Melody with her father. The department then converted Melody's placement with the Engstroms from preadoption to foster care status. Melody continued to live with the Engstroms on a foster care basis until August 1986 when Melody expressed a desire to live with her father. In January 1987 the department transferred custody of Melody from the department to her father.

In May 1987 the plaintiffs commenced this action in district court after complying with the notice procedures of section 25A.5 ¹ of the State Tort Claims Act. The district court granted the State's motion for summary judgment and dismissed the case. It concluded that all of plaintiffs' claims arose out of misrepresentation and the State and its employees are immune from suit for misrepresentation under an exception to the State Tort Claims Act. Iowa Code § 25A.14(4) ².

On appeal, plaintiffs contend that the exception to the State Tort Claims Act is inapplicable because their action is not confined to misrepresentation. They assert that the record supports other theories of liability including (1) several negligence claims for wrongful adoption, including a claim for social worker malpractice; (2) intentional infliction of emotional distress; (3) violation of plaintiffs' substantive and procedural due process rights; and (4) breach of a contract for adoption placement.

Defendants urge two general contentions in a motion for summary judgment and on appeal. First, they urge that the misrepresentation exception to the waiver of sovereign immunity found in chapter 25A effectively precludes their liability. Alternately, they urge that plaintiffs do not have valid causes of action on any of their theories of recovery.

Defendants' reliance upon immunity based on the assumption that all of plaintiffs' claims grow out of misrepresentations presents a serious and difficult issue when, as in this case, we are limited to the pleadings and must decide each issue as a matter of law. To make a determination of the applicability of the exception would require examination of each theory of recovery. We prefer to address defendants' alternate argument and determine the validity of each theory of recovery. On appeal, the prevailing party is entitled to affirmance of the judgment based on the validity of other legally sound theories which were presented and considered by the district court. See Greene v. Friend of Court, Polk County, 406 N.W.2d 433, 435 (Iowa 1987).

I. Summary judgment. The district court sustained defendants' motion for summary judgment. This motion may be sustained only when the moving party shows there is no genuine issue of fact and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Iowa R.Civ.P. 237(c). This burden is upon the moving party. Meyer v. Nottger, 241 N.W.2d 911, 917 (Iowa 1976). If the movant has supported a motion, an adverse party must show a genuine issue of fact and may not rest upon the allegations or denials in their pleadings. Iowa R.Civ.P. 237(e).

II. Breach of contract claim. The district court declared that it found no allegation of breach of contract in plaintiffs' petition and that defendants raised the contract issue for the purpose of determining whether they had violated any duties owed to plaintiffs. On appeal, plaintiffs assert that a breach of contract for adoption placement is actionable and that a fact question is generated on defendants' breach of implied contractual duties of reasonable care and good faith. Plaintiffs claim that the trial court erred in ruling that defendants were not required to fulfill the adoption agreement.

What is required in alleging a breach of contract action? Our rules prescribing notice pleading reveal a liberal view of pleading which does not require a petition to identify a specific theory of recovery if it informs the defendant of the incident out of which the claim arises and gives fair notice of the general nature of the claim. Davis v. Ottumwa YMCA, 438 N.W.2d 10, 13 (Iowa 1989). We do require, however, that the petition give "fair notice" of the claim. Id. (citing Shill v. Careage Corp., 353 N.W.2d 416, 420 (Iowa 1984); Gosha v. Woller, 288 N.W.2d 329, 331 (Iowa 1980)).

In examining plaintiffs' pleading, we find no indication that plaintiffs provided notice that they were relying on a breach of contract claim. A contract or agreement was never mentioned. The petition detailed compliance with the administrative prerequisites to a state tort claim and specifically alleged that defendants' action constituted negligence, outrageous conduct, and a violation of constitutional due process. In resisting defendants' motion for summary judgment, plaintiffs did claim that the meaning of an "Agreement of Placement for Adoption" attached to defendants' motion for summary judgment raised a fact issue of whether defendants breached its implied duty of good faith. Plaintiffs neither amended their pleadings nor filed affidavits or other proof specifying any further terms of the alleged contract.

Standing alone, the placement agreement does not detail duties and obligations owed by defendants to plaintiffs. The agreement provided that plaintiffs would take Melody in their home and provide for her. In the agreement they acknowledged that the child was under guardianship of the department and that the department "may remove the child from our care if it is believed it is for the best interest of the child." It further stated an understanding that plaintiffs could return Melody to the department prior to adoption if she was unacceptable to them.

Plaintiffs urge that a contract for adoption placement is actionable, relying upon principles set forth in Petrowsky v. Family Serv., Inc., 165 Ill.App.3d 32, 37-38, 116 Ill.Dec. 42, 45-46, 518 N.E.2d 664, 667-68 (1987). The Illinois appellate court indicated that the contracting party vested with contractual discretion must exercise it reasonably and that the adoption agency had an implied duty to carry out the terms of the adoption agreement reasonably and in good faith. Id. In this case, plaintiffs' claims center on allegations of a wrongful adoption placement rather than on a failure to properly exercise contractual discretion in performing the terms of the adoption agreement.

The Illinois court further held that under the placement contract the agency had no legal duty to investigate or verify the child's paternity. Id. at 38, 518 N.E.2d at 668. The Illinois court did remand the case for a factual determination on the issue of whether the adoption agency breached its implied duties under the contract by omitting investigation procedures suggested by the plaintiffs. Id. Plaintiffs do not make this claim in this case.

Plaintiffs have cited no case decided by this court that provides a contract remedy...