Hoodbhoy v. Dist. of Columbia

• Decision Date: 22 September 2022
• Docket Number: 20-CV-293
• Parties: Nafisa Hoodbhoy, Appellant, v. District of Columbia, Appellee.
• Court: D.C. Court of Appeals

Nafisa Hoodbhoy, Appellant, v. District of Columbia, Appellee.

No. 20-CV-293

Court of Appeals of The District of Columbia

September 22, 2022

Argued December 8, 2021

Appeal from the Superior Court of the District of Columbia (2019 CA 007484) Hon. Heidi M. Pasichow, Trial Judge

Patrick M. Regan, with whom Christopher J. Regan and Emily C Lagan were on the brief, for appellant.

Holly M. Johnson, Senior Assistant Attorney General, with whom Karl A. Racine, Attorney General for the District of Columbia Loren L. Alikhan, Solicitor General at the time of argument Caroline S. Van Zile, Principal Deputy Solicitor General, and Carl J. Schifferle, Deputy Solicitor General, were on the brief, for appellee.

Before Easterly and Deahl, Associate Judges, and Kravitz, Associate Judge, Superior Court of the District of Columbia. ^[*]

OPINION

Deahl, Associate Judge

Hilman Jordan shot and killed Jawaid Bhutto in the parking lot of the condominium building where they both lived. At the time of the attack, Jordan was on conditional release from Saint Elizabeths Hospital, where he had been committed two decades earlier following his acquittal, by reason of insanity, on a first-degree murder charge. Jordan's release from Saint Elizabeths was granted via a Superior Court order requiring that both Jordan and the D.C. Department of Behavioral Health ("DBH") comply with certain conditions, intended to ensure Jordan would "not pose a danger to himself or others" while living in the community. In the months preceding the shooting, DBH failed to perform several of the duties required by the court order. Most significantly, after Jordan tested positive on multiple drug tests, DBH failed to return him to Saint Elizabeths or even inform the Superior Court of those results.

Bhutto's widow, Nafisa Hoodbhoy, brought a wrongful death and survival action-seeking damages for Bhutto's emotional, psychological, and physical pain in his final minutes, see D.C. Code § 12-101-against the District. She claimed the District was liable for Bhutto's death because it negligently failed to comply with the conditions of Jordan's release, to warn Jordan's neighbors of his propensity for violence, and to ensure that Jordan was not using illegal drugs or obtaining firearms. The trial court granted the District's motion to dismiss Hoodbhoy's complaint, finding that the District was shielded from liability by the "public duty doctrine," under which we have said that the District has "no general duty to provide public services, such as police protection, to any particular individual citizen," but owes such duty only to "the public at large." Warren v. District of Columbia, 444 A.2d 1, 3 (D.C. 1981) (en banc). Citing that doctrine, the court found that, "even assuming [] the District had a nondiscretionary duty" to abide by the conditions of Jordan's release, that duty was owed to the general public-not to Hoodbhoy or Bhutto as individuals. Therefore, the District could not be held liable for negligently failing to prevent Bhutto's death.

Hoodbhoy asks us to reverse. Specifically, she urges us to adopt one or both of two new exceptions to the public duty doctrine, either of which would allow her claims to proceed. Because neither exception is consistent with the doctrine's contours, we affirm.

I.

In 1998, a grand jury indicted Hilman Jordan for first-degree murder after he shot and killed his cousin.^[1] Jordan was found not guilty by reason of insanity and committed to Saint Elizabeths Hospital. In 2003, Jordan was conditionally released from Saint Elizabeths, but was subsequently recommitted two years later, and placed in a maximum security ward, after illegally obtaining a firearm and bringing it to the hospital for the purpose of killing an acquaintance. In 2015, Jordan was once again conditionally released. Shortly thereafter, the Superior Court authorized Jordan's transition to full convalescent leave, issuing an order imposing nineteen conditions that Jordan and DBH were required to follow to ensure that Jordan was properly supervised.

Among the court-ordered conditions of release was a requirement that DBH conduct monthly drug screenings and, if Jordan ever refused to participate or tested positive, notify the court and immediately return him to Saint Elizabeths. In addition, the court order required that Jordan's case manager conduct at least two visits per week, submit monthly written reports to Saint Elizabeths and the court, and notify the court if Jordan was assigned a new case manager or core service agency.

When Jordan was released from Saint Elizabeths, he rented a unit in the condominium building at 2610 Wade Road SE. His unit was located directly above the unit owned and occupied by Nafisa Hoodbhoy and Jawaid Bhutto. In January 2019, Bhutto emailed members of the condominium board, complaining that Jordan was smoking cigarettes and marijuana, and that the stench permeated throughout his unit. Someone on the condominium board showed Jordan the email without redacting Bhutto's name or other identifying information. On March 1, 2019, Jordan approached Bhutto in the condominium building's parking lot, brandished a firearm, chased Bhutto into a corner, shot him, beat him, then kicked him twice in the head. Bhutto died later that day.

According to an internal DBH review, in the months preceding Bhutto's death, DBH failed to comply with five of the nineteen mandatory conditions set forth in the court order authorizing Jordan's release. The most concerning breach was that, even though Jordan tested positive for marijuana on four occasions between June and August 2018, DBH failed to notify the court or return him to Saint Elizabeths as required. DBH also found that seven months preceding the shooting, DBH's contractor averaged only "weekly to bi-weekly" home visits, and that the agency failed to ensure that the contractor submitted its required monthly reports. Finally, DBH found that, though there was a change in Jordan's case manager and core service agency, the agency failed to notify the court.

Bhutto's widow, Hoodbhoy, brought a wrongful death suit against the District. In her complaint, she alleged that the District had "breached the duty owed to the public, including Mr. Bhutto" by: (1) recommending that the court release Jordan into the community and permitting him to live among members of the public, despite knowledge of his history of violence; (2) violating five of the nineteen court-ordered conditions of Jordan's leave; and (3) failing to use reasonable care to protect the public from Jordan by ensuring he was not consuming illegal drugs or illegally obtaining firearms and warning the public of Jordan's "violent and dangerous propensities." The District moved to dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim. Hoodbhoy opposed the District's motion, and at the same time moved to amend her complaint with allegations relating to the results of DBH's internal review. The trial court granted the District's motion to dismiss, finding that the public duty doctrine barred Hoodbhoy's claims. The court also denied Hoodbhoy's motion to amend her complaint, finding that her proffered amendments would be futile because the complaint would still fail to satisfy the requirements of the public duty doctrine.

II.

We review de novo the dismissal of a complaint for failure to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6). Potomac Dev. Corp. v. District of Columbia, 28 A.3d 531, 543 (D.C. 2011). In conducting our review, we apply "the same standard the trial court was required to apply, accepting the allegations in the complaint as true and viewing all facts and drawing all reasonable inferences in favor of the plaintiffs." Hillbroom v. PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, 17 A.3d 566, 572 (D.C. 2011).

For a claim sounding in negligence, like wrongful death, the plaintiff must show: "(1) that the defendant owed a duty to the plaintiff, (2) breach of that duty, and (3) injury to the plaintiff that was proximately caused by the breach." Hedgepeth v. Whitman Walker Clinic, 22 A.3d 789, 793 (D.C. 2011). When the District or its agents take action that "directly" harms an individual, the law of negligence applies to it as it would to any other tortfeasor. District of Columbia v. Evans, 644 A.2d 1008, 1017 n.8 (D.C. 1994).^[2] However, when a plaintiff alleges the "District negligently failed to protect [them] from harm," the first element of a negligence claim-duty-is governed by the public duty doctrine, under which the "government and its agents are under no general duty to provide public services, such as police protection, to any particular individual citizen." Klahr v. District of Columbia, 576 A.2d 718, 719-20 (D.C. 1990) (quoting Warren, 444 A.2d at 4). In any case where the public duty doctrine applies, "a person seeking to hold the District of Columbia liable for negligence must allege and prove that the District owed a special duty to the injured party, greater than or different from any duty which it owed to the general public." Id. at 719. "Absent a special relationship between the District and an individual, no specific legal duty exists, and . . . a claim of simple negligence will fail as a matter of law." Woods v. District of Columbia, 63 A.3d 551, 553 (D.C. 2013) (cleaned up) (quoting Warren, 444 A.2d at 3, 4).

We have recognized that there are "at least two ways to demonstrate the existence of a 'special relationship'" between the District and an individual. Turner v. District of Columbia, 532 A.2d 662, 667 (D.C. 1987). First, a special relationship can be established by "(1) a direct . . . or continuing contact between the victim and the governmental agency or official; and (2) a justifiable reliance on the part of the victim." Platt v....