General Motors Corp. v. Piskor

• Decision Date: 23 December 1977
• Docket Number: No. 64,64
• Citation: 381 A.2d 16,281 Md. 627
• Parties: , 93 A.L.R.3d 1097 GENERAL MOTORS CORPORATION v. Roy J. PISKOR.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

Page 627

281 Md. 627

381 A.2d 16, 93 A.L.R.3d 1097

GENERAL MOTORS CORPORATION v. Roy J. PISKOR.

No. 64.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

Dec. 23, 1977.

Edward S. Digges, Jr., and Robert Dale Klein, Baltimore (Joseph G. Finnerty, Jr., and Francis B. Burch, Jr., Baltimore, and Frazer F. Hilder, Gen. Counsel, General Motors Corp., Detroit, Mich., on the brief), for appellant.

Leo A. Hughes, Jr., Baltimore (Robert W. Fox, Ronald L. Lapides and Steen, Hughes & Seigel, Baltimore, on the brief), for appellee.

Argued before MURPHY, C. J., and SMITH, LEVINE, ELDRIDGE and ORTH, JJ.

LEVINE, Judge.

At the heart of this appeal is the question whether our holding in H & R Block, Inc. v. Testerman, 275 Md. 36, 338 A.2d 48 (1975), requires an employee to prove actual malice in the common law sense of spite, hatred or animosity in order to recover punitive damages in an action against his employer for false imprisonment and assault.

This is the second time this case has been before us. In General Motors Corp. v. Piskor, 277 Md. 165, 352 A.2d 810 (1976), we were concerned with the nature of the proof necessary to sustain an award of punitive damages in defamation cases as a matter of federal constitutional and state tort law. On remand, following our decision in Piskor, a jury in the Superior Court of Baltimore City (Levin, J.) presented appellee with his second award of punitive damages this time in the amount of $35,000 for the non-defamation torts of false imprisonment and assault. Appellant then noted an appeal to the Court of Special Appeals, but we granted certiorari before the case was heard by that court. We now affirm.

The jury at the first trial awarded Piskor compensatory damages of $1,000 for slander, $300 for assault, and $200 for false imprisonment. The jury also assessed punitive damages of $25,000. ¹ On appeal, the Court of Special Appeals affirmed. 27 Md.App. 95, 340 A.2d 767 (1975). We then affirmed recovery of the compensatory damages for false imprisonment and assault, but reversed the slander and punitive damage awards, remanding those issues for a new trial in light of Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 94 S.Ct. 2997, 41 L.Ed.2d 789 (1974), and Jacron Sales Co. v. Sindorf, 276 Md. 580, 350 A.2d 688 (1976).

At the commencement of the new trial, Piskor entered a voluntary dismissal of the slander count, leaving only the punitive damage claim to be resolved. The material testimony at the second trial differs in but a few limited respects from the evidence at the earlier trial. For convenience, then, we shall recount here our prior summary of the testimony with such minor editing and deletions as we think necessary:

"On December 30, 1969, the date on which the incident precipitating this case occurred, Piskor, then 19 years of age, was employed by General Motors at its automobile assembly plant in Baltimore. Within a matter of minutes, shortly before the end of his shift, he twice left his place on the 'hard trim line' to visit a fellow employee who worked on the 'console line.' It was on the console line that such components as radios, tape players and tachometers were installed in automobiles, necessitating the storage of a quantity of those items nearby. Largely because of their small size and high value, these items (had) presented something of a security problem as evidenced by the significant loss by theft which had been experienced.

"Approximately 15 to 20 minutes before the end of the shift on the day in question, Piskor made his first visit to the console line to check with his fellow employee about a ride home. He then returned to his own work area. A few minutes before the shift was to end, he again visited the same employee, this time fully clothed in his street apparel, which included an army fatigue jacket that was zipped up to the neck. The jacket had two large 'kangaroo' pockets in front, which were of sufficient size to permit the wearer to touch his hands together while inside the pockets. The foreman of the console line, whose responsibilities included the care of components being installed under his supervision, observed Piskor during both visits. In describing the second visit, he depicted Piskor as leaving with his hands in the two front pockets while 'in a stooped or hunched fashion with his hands pushed forward in the front of his jacket.' His posture and movements created the effect of his jacket 'sticking out some from his stomach.' The shift having then ended, Piskor left his friend a second time and passed through his own work area without stopping, heading directly for the exit. After witnessing all this, the foreman of the console line telephoned a sergeant on the security force and asked him to watch out for Piskor, whom he described to the sergeant, and to 'see if he noticed anything suspicious.'

"In order for the employees to exit from the assembly plant, it was first necessary for them to 'punch out' at one of the time clocks, and then to climb two flights of stairs before reaching the door to the outside. On the landing between these two stairways was a room with plate glass walls, which was called the 'guard shack.' Security guards were routinely positioned on this landing during shift changes to inspect any packages or purses being carried by employees.

"What transpired from the moment of Piskor's arrival at the stairs, by this time crowded with many other employees, is the subject of some dispute. According to Piskor's own testimony, as he was ascending the first flight, he observed the foreman of the console line pointing at him and shouting. Once on the landing, he was 'grabbed by one guard' from whom he (broke) free only to have another guard make the same attempt. He then began to run or walk rapidly up the second flight of stairs only to find other guards blocking his path, giving him 'no other choice' but to return to the landing. When asked what occurred there, Piskor replied: 'At that point he said he wanted to talk to me. And then I asked him if he was calling me a thief.'

"According to Piskor, the guards indicated that they wanted him to go into the guard shack. He balked at this and, in his own words, 'yelled' and 'screamed' at them in an effort to discover why they were detaining him. They merely replied that they wanted to establish his identity. They (physically) 'assisted' him, he said, into the guard room and he, after resisting for some time their efforts at persuading him to open his jacket, ultimately threw it open, unbuckled his trousers gratuitously and 'showed them everything they wanted to see.' It developed that he had not concealed any General Motors' property beneath the jacket. On cross-examination, he not only repeated his earlier testimony that, when first approached, he had spontaneously shouted 'are you calling me a thief,' but also conceded that at the time he uttered a few obscenities. After demonstrating inside the guard shack that nothing was hidden beneath his jacket and denying that he had taken any property, Piskor was released." 277 Md. at 167-69, 352 A.2d at 812.

Evidence at the second trial established that there was a 30-minute interval between shifts at the General Motors plant. During this period it was customary for the foreman of the console line to conduct an inventory check of the radios on hand to account for the number installed in the preceding eight hours. This procedure required "five, ten minutes at the most," but was not followed on the particular occasion in controversy, according to the foreman, because his suspicions were not aroused until "three or four minutes before quitting time," which would not have permitted an inventory before Piskor "could check out and (leave) to go home." The evidence revealed, however, that Piskor was detained for approximately 35 minutes.

At the conclusion of all the evidence in the second trial, appellant raised two legal issues in its motion for directed verdict that had never been presented in this case. First, appellant argued that it was immune from this lawsuit because Piskor had resorted to the grievance procedure prescribed in the collective bargaining agreement entered into between General Motors and the United Auto Workers, of which he was a member. ² Secondly, appellant contended that because the false imprisonment and assault were torts arising out of a contractual relationship, actual malice was required to support an award of punitive damages. Hence, since no actual malice had been established, appellee could not, as a matter of law, recover such damages. The trial judge rejected both arguments and for reasons that follow, we do also.

(1)

At the outset, we are confronted with a preliminary question: whether, as Piskor contends, appellant was precluded at the trial and thus here from raising the two substantive issues it now urges upon this Court. Piskor's argument is that appellant was foreclosed by our prior decision from raising these matters at the second trial, particularly since the failure to present them at the first trial was attributed merely to an oversight. Appellant argues that the issue of actual malice is directly related to the recovery of punitive damages and was therefore presented in timely fashion. We agree that the subject of actual malice was within the scope of our mandate regarding the punitive damage issue, even though it was presented as a question of law, rather than one of fact.

We are of the view, however, that whether utilization of the grievance procedure barred appellee from suing for damages is a matter clearly beyond the scope of our prior mandate. We remanded the case for a new trial on the punitive damages issue merely because we could not "determine the extent, if any, to which the sum allowed for punitive damages was specifically linked to the slander," for which such damages could not be awarded absent a showing of knowing falsity or reckless disregard for truth. General Motors Corp. v. Piskor, 277 Md. at...