LaPlaca v. Lowery

• Decision Date: 02 December 1975
• Docket Number: No. 99-75,99-75
• Citation: 134 Vt. 56,349 A.2d 235
• Court: Vermont Supreme Court
• Parties: Joseph LaPLACA v. John A. LOWERY.

Page 235

349 A.2d 235

134 Vt. 56

Joseph LaPLACA v. John A. LOWERY.

No. 99-75.

Supreme Court of Vermont.

Dec. 2, 1975.

Guarino & Bean, White River Junction, for plaintiff.

Dinse, Allen & Erdmann, Burlington, for defendant.

M. Jerome Diamond, Atty. Gen., and James E. Hirsch, Asst. Atty. Gen., Montpelier, for State of Vermont.

Before BARNEY, C. J., SMITH, DALEY and LARROW, JJ., and DIER, Superior Judge, Specially Assigned.

SMITH, Justice.

The plaintiff, Joseph LaPlaca, brought a complaint in the Windsor Superior Court against John A. Lowery, presiding judge of the District Court of Vermont, Unit No. 6, Windham Circuit. The complaint alleges that the defendant slandered him during an arraignment session of the District Court in January, 1975. The specific complaint is that he called the plaintiff a liar in the presence of numerous persons and court personnel on a motion to dismiss. Based on the ground that judicial immunity protected the allegedly slanderous words, the Windsor Superior Court dismissed the cause in March, 1975.

The issue presented is whether the lower court committed error in finding that the doctrine of judicial immunity sheltered the words complained of.

The inquiry under a motion to dismiss relates only to what appears of record and does not reach defects that require extrinsic proof to establish.' Hanley v. United Steel Workers v. America, 119 Vt. 187, 190, 122 A.2d 872, 874 (1956). The only record which appeared before the lower court was plaintiff's complaint. The defendant has made a transcript of the proceeding in the District Court a part of the record before this Court. The transcript disclosed the allegedly slanderous words, and that the statements were made during a hearing on a motion for the defendant judge to disqualify himself from hearing the traffic offense in which the plaintiff was involved. The motion to disqualify was granted. However, this transcript was not introduced at the lower court hearing, and we cannot consider it here.

Vermont law has included a doctrine of judicial immunity which applies to judges, attorneys, and witnesses, since the cases of Mower v. Watson, 11 Vt. 536, 34 Am.Dev. 704 (1839), and Torrey v. Field, 10 Vt. 353, 414, in 1838. Banister v. Wakeman, 64 Vt. 203, 208, 23 A. 585 (1891) quotes with approval a dissenting opinion of Judge Powers in Vaughn v. Congdon, 56 Vt. 111, 128, 48 Am.Rep. 758 (1883):

Immunity from liability in favor of the judges rests upon the broad ground of public policy, which declares that a judge, for acts done by him in his public capacity, is absolutely privileged from action. It is an official privilege, which, though it covers a multitude of sins, is still absolutely essential to the due administration of justice. It is a privilege not primarily designed for the protection of the judge, but for the protection of the public, by making the judges free, independent and fearless in the discharge of their duties.

The essential question, therefore, is whether the statements were made during the performance of an act which was judicial, and within his general authority. 'This immunity does not reach beyond judicial acts.' Polidor v. Mahady, 130 Vt. 173, 174, 287 A.2d 841, 843 (1972).

We must now turn, as the lower court did, to the pertinent allegation of the complaint of the plaintiff:

. . . 2. At an arraignment session of said Vermont District Court, held on January 7, 1975, at the Court Room in Brattleboro, Vermont, the defendant, before numerous persons and in the presence of the Court stenographer, Arlene J. Patterson, who was making an electronic recording of the words...