Reddish v. Smith

• Decision Date: 04 April 1985
• Docket Number: No. 63950,63950
• Citation: 468 So.2d 929,10 Fla. L. Weekly 195
• Parties: 10 Fla. L. Weekly 195 J.R. REDDISH and the Department of Corrections of the State of Florida, Petitioners, v. Charles W. SMITH and Emma L. Smith, his wife, Respondents.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

Page 929

468 So.2d 929

10 Fla. L. Weekly 195

J.R. REDDISH and the Department of Corrections of the State of Florida, Petitioners, v. Charles W. SMITH and Emma L. Smith, his wife, Respondents.

No. 63950.

Supreme Court of Florida.

April 4, 1985.

Richard L. Randle of Slater and Randle, Jacksonville, for petitioners.

Kenneth Vickers of Vickers and Rohan, Jacksonville, for respondents.

Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., and Miguel A. Olivella, Asst. Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, amicus curiae for Atty. Gen. of The State of Florida.

Barry Richard of Roberts, Baggett, LaFace, Richard and Wiser, Tallahassee, amicus curiae for James M. Johnson.

BOYD, Chief Justice.

This cause is before the Court on petition for review of a decision of the First District Court of Appeal reversing the dismissal of the respondents' complaint against a state agency and a state employee. Smith v. Department of Corrections, 432 So.2d 1338 (Fla. 1st DCA 1983). The district court certified that its decision passed upon a question of great public importance. We have jurisdiction. Art. V, § 3(b)(4), Fla. Const.

The complaint alleged as follows. In February, 1973, a man named Prince was sentenced to life imprisonment, having been adjudged guilty of first-degree murder. At about the same time, Prince's parole from a previously imposed twenty-year sentence for the offense of armed robbery was revoked. In 1974, Prince was sent to a minimum-security vocational training center in Clay County. In October, 1974, he escaped. He was recaptured several days later at a hospital in Jacksonville where he was being treated for gunshot wounds. Prince received a sentence of an additional year in prison after pleading guilty to escape. Upon being again processed into the state prison system, Prince was designated for assignment to a maximum-security facility.

The complaint went on to allege as follows. In May, 1976, defendant (petitioner) J.R. Reddish caused Prince's classification to be changed from "medium custody status" to "minimum custody status." Reddish made use of the personal services of Prince in connection with Reddish's relocation from the Lake Butler Reception and Medical Center to Union Correctional Institute. Reddish effected Prince's transfer to the latter facility and personally transported him there. While Prince was an inmate of Union Correctional Institute and Reddish an employee, Reddish used Prince as a servant in his home. In August, 1977, Reddish asked departmental authorities to transfer Prince to Lawtey Correctional Institute, a minimum-security facility. The necessary authorizations were given within the month and in October, 1977, Prince was transferred. In March, 1978, Prince escaped. In June, 1978, Prince abducted and shot with a firearm plaintiff-respondent Charles W. Smith during the course of a robbery in Jacksonville. The complaint alleged damages resulting from this shooting.

The theory of liability expressed in the complaint is two-fold. On one theory, the respondents claimed that Reddish and other officials of the Department of Corrections failed to conform to the proper standard of care to be taken in classifying and assigning the custody of prisoners. The other theory is that Reddish himself acted in a willful, wanton, and malicious manner, and that his actions regarding Prince were wrongful and were taken in bad faith for personal gain.

On motion of the defendants the complaint was dismissed. As was stated above, the district court of appeal reversed. The dismissal was grounded upon the sovereign immunity of a state agency in performing a discretionary function and upon lack of foreseeability due to the lapse of time between the acts of classification and assignment and the escape. Regarding the second point, the district court held that in view of the prisoner's prior record it was foreseeable that he would try to escape and if successful commit another violent crime.

On the issue of sovereign immunity, the district court reasoned that not all four questions set forth in Commercial Carrier Corp. v. Indian River County, 371 So.2d 1010 (Fla.1979), could clearly be answered in the affirmative. "In particular," the court said, "while inmate classification is necessary to the maintenance of a prison system, this inmate's reclassification appears to have been made for reasons unrelated to the functioning of the prison system and without use of agency expertise." 432 So.2d at 1340. The district court certified the following as a question of great public importance: "May prisoner classifications ever give rise to tort liability, and, if so, under what circumstances?" 432 So.2d at 1343.

In Commercial Carrier, this Court recognized a distinction between planning-level, discretionary policy-making decisions on the one hand, and operational-level decisions on the other, for purposes of applying the statutory waiver of sovereign immunity, holding that the former type of governmental decision was still immune while the latter was covered by the waiver and therefore could be actionable. The Court summed up its decision by holding

that although section 768.28 [Florida Statutes (1975) ] evinces the intent of our legislature to waive sovereign immunity on a broad basis, nevertheless, certain "discretionary" governmental functions remain immune from tort liability. This is so because certain functions of coordinate branches of government may not be subjected to scrutiny by judge or jury as to the wisdom of their performance. In order to identify those functions, we adopt the analysis of Johnson v. State, supra [69 Cal.2d 782, 73 Cal.Rptr. 240, 447 P.2d 352 (1968) ], which distinguishes between the "planning" and "operational" levels of decision-making by government agencies. In pursuance of this case-by-case method of proceeding, we commend utilization of the preliminary test iterated in Evangelical United Brethren Church v. State, supra [67 Wash.2d 246, 407 P.2d 440 (1965) ], as a useful tool for analysis.

371 So.2d at 1022. The commended preliminary test was set forth at an earlier point in the opinion and contains the four questions referred to by the district court of appeal in the instant case:

Whatever the suitable characterization or label might be, it would appear that any determination of a line of demarcation between truly discretionary and other executive and administrative processes, so far as susceptibility to potential sovereign tort liability be concerned, would necessitate a posing of at least the following four preliminary questions: (1) Does the decision necessarily involve a basic governmental policy, program, or objective? (2) Is the questioned act, omission, or decision essential to the realization or accomplishment of that policy, program, or objective as opposed to one which would not change the course or direction of the policy, program, or objective? (3) Does the act, omission, or decision require the exercise of basic policy evaluation, judgment, and expertise on the part of the governmental agency involved? (4) Does the governmental agency involved possess the requisite constitutional, statutory, or lawful authority and duty to do or make the challenged act, omission, or decision? If these preliminary questions can be clearly and unequivocally answered in the affirmative, then the challenged act, omission, or decision can, with a reasonable degree of assurance, be classified as a discretionary governmental process and nontortious, regardless of its unwisdom. If, however, one or more of the questions call for or suggest a negative answer, then further inquiry may well become necessary, depending upon the facts and circumstances involved.

371 So.2d at 1019 (quoting Evangelical United Brethren Church v. State, 67 Wash.2d 246, 255, 407 P.2d 440, 445 (1965)).

We have little difficulty concluding that with regard to the classification and assignment of prisoners within the state prison system, all four of these questions can clearly and unequivocally be answered in the affirmative. The administrative process in question is an inherent feature of the essential governmental role assigned to the Department of Corrections and is authorized by statute. § 945.06, Fla.Stat. (1977); see also id. § 944.012(6). We therefore conclude that under Commercial Carrier the claims against the Department of Corrections and, to the extent based upon negligent performance of duties within the scope of employment, against Reddish, are precluded by sovereign immunity. See, e.g., Harrison v. Escambia County School Board, 434 So.2d 316 (Fla.1983); Department of Transportation v. Neilson, 419 So.2d 1071 (Fla.1982). The complaint in this case was based on the classification and assignment of Prince and not on the possible negligence of the department's employees having a direct and operational-level duty to supervise him and keep him confined at the time of his escape.

Moreover, even if it could be said that the decisions complained of in this case were on the operational level, we would hold that there can be no liability imposed on the Department of Corrections. The waiver of sovereign immunity statute makes clear that it is just that: a waiver of the absolute immunity previously barring the imposition of any liability upon the state. As we hold in the decision made today in Trianon Park Condominium Association v. City of Hialeah, 468 So.2d 912 (Fla.1985), the waiver statute created no new causes of action not previously recognized by common-law principles of tort responsibility.

The statute waiving sovereign immunity provided in pertinent part as follows:

Actions at law against the state or any of its agencies or subdivisions to recover damages in tort for money damages against the state or its agencies or subdivisions for injury or loss of property, personal injury, or death caused by the negligent or wrongful act or omission of any employee of the agency or subdivision while acting within the scope of his office or employment under...