Murphy v. Jefferson Pilot Communications Co., C.A. No. 2:08-CV-1078.
| Decision Date | 04 November 2008 |
| Docket Number | C.A. No. 2:08-CV-1078. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of South Carolina |
| Parties | Elizabeth MURPHY and Christopher Murphy, Plaintiffs, v. JEFFERSON PILOT COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY n/k/a Lincoln Financial Communications Company, WCSC Inc., d/b/a WCSC Channel 5, and Liberty Mutual Insurance Company, Defendants. |
Grahame Ellison Holmes, John E. Parker, Peters Murdaugh Parker Eltzroth and Detrick, Walterboro, SC, for Plaintiffs.
Mark Hedderman Wall, Elmore and Wall, Morgan S. Templeton, Charleston, SC, C. Mitchell Brown, Don Lawrence Kristinik, III, William C. Wood, Jr., Nelson Mullins Riley and Scarborough, Columbia, SC, for Defendants.
This matter is before the court on Defendant Liberty Mutual Insurance Company's ("Liberty Mutual") Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings, Defendant Jefferson Pilot Communications Company ("Jefferson Pilot") and WCSC Channel 5's ("WCSC") Motion to Dismiss, and Plaintiffs Elizabeth and Christopher Murray's ("Plaintiffs") Motion to Remand. For the reasons set forth herein, Plaintiffs' Motion to Remand is denied, Defendant Jefferson Pilot and WCSC's Motion to Dismiss is granted, and Defendant Liberty Mutual's Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings is held to be moot.
Donald Feldman ("Feldman") was the "Assistant VP News" for Jefferson Pilot and news director for WCSC, which was owned by Jefferson Pilot. He reported directly to Jefferson Pilot's General Manager. As part of his duties as news director, he oversaw a program called "Carolina Gang," a panel show which focused on local political issues. Feldman met a local attorney, Sandra Senn ("Senn"), and asked her to become a regular panelist for the show. She agreed, and began appearing regularly on the show.
Senn had formerly been employed by the Stuckey Law Firm, but had recently left the firm under contentious circumstances. Senn appears to have had a particularly acrimonious relationship with Plaintiff Elizabeth Murphy ("Murphy"), who was also an attorney at the firm. Senn apparently voiced her frustrations over her relationships with both Murphy individually and the Stuckey firm overall in private conversations with Feldman.
In what was apparently an attempt to impress Senn, Feldman phoned Senn on July 23, 1999, and told her that he had just gotten off a flight from Charleston to Atlanta, and that Murphy had also been a passenger on the flight. Feldman reported that while on the flight, Murphy, who was traveling with a man who was not her husband, had gotten extremely intoxicated and had loudly made defamatory statements to other passengers about Senn's personal life and bedroom habits as well as her professional competence and demeanor.
Feldman later e-mailed Senn telling her that he would not stand for Murphy's behavior and slanderous statements regarding Senn, and that he was going to get involved to make sure that Murphy realized she could no longer behave in this fashion. Feldman later told Senn that he had sent a letter to Murphy, and provided Senn with a copy of the letter. The letter was printed on WCSC letterhead and addressed to Murphy,1 and threatened legal action due to Murphy's "slanderous" comments aboard the flight in question. The letter invoked the fact that Senn was "a WCSC Air Personality," and stated that it was in the best interests of WCSC to protect the reputations of its on-air personnel. He claimed that he was seeking a passenger list from the flight in question to prove that Murphy was on the flight and to uncover the identity of Murphy's alleged paramour, as well as to prove that Murphy had been drinking to excess aboard the flight. He also claimed that he would use the passenger list to discover which passengers had been sitting near Murphy so as to have overheard her comments, and would interview them to see if it had negatively impacted their view of either WCSC or Senn. After this information was discovered, Feldman claimed he was going to seek the counsel of WCSC's legal department to see if any legal action could be taken against Murphy. Feldman concluded the letter by hinting that he would be willing to enter into settlement negotiations with Murphy so as to avoid a potential lawsuit against her. The letter was signed, "Donald M. Feldman, Vice-President/News Director." Feldman later reported to Senn that Murphy had taken him up on his offer of possibly settling the matter, and that Murphy had come to the station several times to talk to him about the possibility of entering into a settlement agreement, and Feldman and Senn even worked together on drafting the terms of a tentative settlement agreement. In September, Senn took the copy of the letter given to her by Feldman to the attorney representing her in her dispute with the Stuckey Law Firm, and requested that he handle any potential claim arising from the incident on the airplane as well. Her attorney contacted the Stuckey Law Firm's attorney about the incident, and produced a copy of the letter, which the law firm's attorney then passed along to Murphy.
The letter's reports of her scandalous and malicious behavior aboard the flight came as some surprise to Murphy, who had in fact been in Charleston attending a soccer game and birthday party during the flight. Feldman, in what appears to have been a bizarre attempt to impress or woo Senn, fabricated the entirety of the events and allegations in question, and was never in possession of any sort of damning evidence regarding Murphy. However, Feldman stuck to his story as it was questioned by Murphy's attorney, who had contacted WCSC's counsel and general manager regarding the letter and allegations. Feldman stated that the allegations were in fact true and that sending the letter was necessary to protect WCSC's integrity, and that WCSC's former station manager had approved the contents of the letter. In November 2000, Feldman was arrested for embezzling more than $2 million from WCSC, and around this time it became clear to all involved that Feldman had, in fact, fabricated the entire incident and all allegations about Murphy's conduct.
Murphy was severely affected by Feldman's untruthful allegations about her, and experienced severe depression that dramatically affected her quality of life, her marriage, and forced her to abandon the practice of law. In 2001, Plaintiffs filed a lawsuit against Jefferson Pilot, WCSC, and Feldman in the Charleston County Court of Common Pleas, alleging that Feldman had defamed Murphy while acting within the scope of his employment, and committed intentional infliction of emotional distress. The initial jury trial took eight days, at the conclusion of which, on May 21, 2003, the trial judge granted WCSC and Jefferson Pilot's motions for a directed verdict on public policy grounds. The only issue submitted to the jury, therefore, was the issue of Feldman's liability. The jury returned a verdict against Feldman in the amount of just over $9 million.
Liberty Mutual had retained attorney Patrick Higgins ("Higgins") to represent Feldman in this matter. However, Feldman, on his own, retained attorney Coming Gibbs ("Gibbs") to represent him. In May 2002, Feldman specifically notified Liberty Mutual that he "intends not to cooperate or discuss this case with anyone at Liberty Mutual and/or any counsel they may retain concerning this matter." (Def.'s Mem. Ex. C.) He also specifically requested that Liberty Mutual not provide counsel for him. Finally, he notified Liberty Mutual that he "specifically waives any coverage which may be available to him under any policies issued by Liberty Mutual Insurance Company." Id. Based on this communication, on September 4, 2002, Liberty Mutual therefore denied Feldman any coverage to which he may have otherwise been entitled, and also instructed Higgins to withdraw from any representation of Feldman. Higgins filed a motion to withdraw as counsel in state court, and the motion was granted without opposition from either side.
After the verdict against him, Feldman filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy. In September 2005, the United States Bankruptcy Court filed an Order of Discharge pertaining to his debts.
Plaintiffs appealed the trial court's grant of a directed verdict as to their claims against WCSC and Jefferson Pilot. On appeal, the South Carolina Court of Appeals reversed this decision of the trial court, and remanded the case back to the Charleston County Court of Common Pleas for a new trial against WCSC and Jefferson Pilot. Murphy v. Jefferson Pilot Commc'ns Co., 364 S.C. 453, 613 S.E.2d 808 (Ct.App.2005). The retrial occurred in September 2007. At the outset of this trial, Plaintiffs filed a "Motion to Establish Facts" seeking to establish that the only issue to be decided by the second trial was whether Feldman's actions occurred within the scope of his employment with WCSC and Jefferson Pilot. The court denied this, ruling that the issue of damages was to be retried, and informed Plaintiffs' counsel that if they wished to continue to litigate the issue of the appropriate scope of the second trial, they should appeal this ruling before the trial started. Plaintiffs' attorney declined this opportunity to file an interlocutory appeal, and explicitly acknowledged at a hearing that he understood that by going forward he was waiving his right to contest the trial court's decision. At the conclusion of the trial the jury found that WCSC and Jefferson Pilot were liable for Feldman's behavior, and ordered them to pay almost $4 million to Plaintiffs. Defendants appealed this judgment, and that appeal is currently pending in state court. Defendants have paid the damages, which are being held by the state court until the appeal is resolved.
In February 2008, Feldman assigned all rights pertaining to his policy with Liberty Mutual to Plaintiffs.
Plaintiffs commenced this...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Liberty Mut. Ins. Co. v. Westport Ins. Corp., C.A. No. 2:07-CV-3729.
...This matter is factually related to another matter in which this Court previously issued an Order, Murphy v. Jefferson Pilot Communications Co., 657 F.Supp.2d 683 (D.S.C.2008). The case involved the actions of Donald Feldman ("Feldman"), formerly the "Assistant VP News" for Jefferson Pilot ......
-
Black Magic, LLC v. Hartford Fin. Servs. Grp.
...Non-Writing Defendants cannot be held liable for breaching a contract to which they are not a party. See Murphy v. Jefferson Pilot Commc'ns Co., 657 F. Supp. 2d 683, 693 (D.S.C. 2008) ("Only parties to a contract may be sued for a breach of contract cause of action."); see also Winkler v. H......
-
Fancy That! Bistro & Catering LLC v. Sentinel Ins. Co.
...HFSG. HFSG cannot be held liable for breaching a contract to which it is not a party. See Murphy v. Jefferson Pilot Commc'ns Co., 657 F.Supp.2d 683, 693 (D.S.C. 2008) (“Only parties to a contract may be sued for a breach of contract cause of action.”); see also Winkler v. Hartford Fin. Serv......
-
Gillins v. Celadon Trucking Servs., Inc.
...607, 608 (S.C. 1969). "Only parties to a contract may be sued for a breach of contract cause of action." Murphy v. Jefferson Pilot Commc'ns Co., 657 F. Supp. 2d 683, 693 (D.S.C. 2008). Celadon focuses heavily upon the fact that the Agreement states it is between Gillins and Quality Leasing,......