Semler v. Psychiatric Institute of Washington, D. C.

• Decision Date: 28 March 1978
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — District of Columbia Circuit

Page 922

575 F.2d 922

188 U.S.App.D.C. 41

Helen SEMLER, Administratrix of the Estate of Natalia

Semler, Deceased, Appellant v PSYCHIATRIC INSTITUTE OF WASHINGTON, D. C., INC., et al.

Helen SEMLER, Administratrix of the Estate of Natalia Semler, Deceased v PSYCHIATRIC INSTITUTE OF WASHINGTON, D. C., INC., et al., Appellants.

Nos. 76-2056 and 76-2059.

United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit.

Argued 1 Dec. 1977.

Decided 28 March 1978.

Robert W. Lewis, Washington, D. C., for Helen Semler, Administratrix of the Estate of Natalia Semler, deceased.

Quentin R. Corrie, Annandale, Va., of the bar of the Supreme Court of Virginia, pro hac vice, by special leave of Court, for appellee. Anthony F. Troy, Atty. Gen. of Virginia, Stuart H. Dunn, Deputy Atty. Gen. and Henry M. Massie, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen., Richmond, Va., were on the brief, for appellee, Paul Folliard. Darryl L. Wyland, Falls Church, Va., was on the brief, for appellee.

Before WRIGHT, McGOWAN and WILKEY, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by WILKEY, Circuit Judge.

WILKEY, Circuit Judge:

The issue presented in this case is whether a Virginia judgment for plaintiff under the Virginia Wrongful Death Act ¹ precludes plaintiff from seeking further recovery in a District of Columbia court for the same wrongful death under the District of Columbia Wrongful Death Act ² and Survival Act. ³

In 1972 John Gilreath was convicted in a Virginia state court for the abduction of a young girl. The judge sentenced Gilreath to 20 years' imprisonment but suspended the sentence, conditioned on his continued treatment and confinement at the Psychiatric Institute of Washington, D.C. ⁴ In September 1973, without the approval of the Virginia court but with the sanction of Gilreath's probation officer, the Psychiatric Institute placed Gilreath in a loosely structured and generally unsupervised out-patient program. The following month Gilreath murdered a young woman, Natalia Semler, in Fairfax, Virginia.

Helen Semler, the deceased's mother and personal representative, brought an action under the Virginia Wrongful Death Act in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ⁵ against the Psychiatric Institute and other defendants associated with the Institute, contending that defendants had been negligent in their supervision and control of Gilreath and that this negligence proximately caused the death of plaintiff's daughter. On 17 October 1974 the district court, sitting without a jury, found the defendants liable and on 18 October entered judgment for $25,000.

One week later, on 25 October 1974, plaintiff filed the instant action against the same defendants under the District of Columbia Wrongful Death Act and Survival Act in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.

On 29 September 1976 the District Judge issued an order ⁶ granting defendants' motion for summary judgment on the ground that plaintiff's District of Columbia action was precluded by the res judicata effect of the judgment plaintiff had already obtained in the previous Virginia action. The case is before us on plaintiff's appeal from this order. For the reasons stated herein, we affirm the District Court.

I. ANALYTIC OVERVIEW

This wrongful death case involves two jurisdictions the state of Virginia and the District of Columbia. These jurisdictions follow different choice of law rules. The choice of law rule for wrongful death followed by Virginia courts is that the law of the place of the wrong determines the existence and nature of a cause of action for death, unless another state has a more significant relationship to the occurrence or the parties with respect to a particular issue. ⁷ The "place of the wrong" is defined as "the place the harmful force takes effect upon the body." ⁸ In contrast, the District of Columbia has increasingly applied an "interest analysis" approach in determining the law applicable in tort cases in general ⁹ and wrongful death cases in particular. ¹⁰ Simply stated, the method of governmental interest analysis is (1) to identify the state policies underlying each law in conflict, and (2) to decide which state's policy would be advanced by having its law applied to the facts at bar. ¹¹

Moreover, the substantive laws governing wrongful death in Virginia and the District of Columbia are different. At common law no civil action was maintainable in either jurisdiction against a person for the wrongful death of another. A right of action for personal injuries did not survive the death of the injured party. Both jurisdictions have now changed this rule by statute.

Under District of Columbia law, negligent conduct resulting in death gives rise to two independent rights of action, one under the Wrongful Death Act and one under the Survival Act, upon each of which damages may be sought. ¹² The Wrongful Death Act is said to create an entirely new right of action in favor of designated beneficiaries. ¹³ It is designed to provide a remedy whereby close relatives of the deceased, who might naturally have expected maintenance or assistance from the deceased had he lived, may recover compensation from the wrongdoer commensurate with the loss sustained. Thus, proper recovery under this Act is based on the pecuniary benefits that the statutory beneficiaries might reasonably be expected to have derived from the deceased had he lived. ¹⁴

The Survival Act, on the other hand, does not create a new right of action for designated beneficiaries, but rather preserves and carries forward for the benefit of the deceased's estate the right of action which the deceased would have had, had he not died. ¹⁵ The Act is designed to place the deceased's estate in the position it would have been in had the deceased's life not been cut short. Thus, proper recovery under the Act is based on the probable net future earnings reduced by the amount deceased would have used to maintain himself and those entitled to recover under the Wrongful Death Act. ¹⁶

Virginia, in contrast, provides only one exclusive right of action in wrongful death cases. The Virginia Wrongful Death Act, like its District of Columbia counterpart, creates in the deceased's personal representative a new right of action for the benefit of certain designated beneficiaries. ¹⁷ At the time of deceased's death, it provided for recovery up to $25,000 exclusively for solace and up to $50,000 for financial loss sustained by deceased's dependents. It is clear under Virginia law that this statutory provision is intended to be the exclusive basis of recovery for wrongful death, and it exists in lieu of an action based on the survival of the deceased's original claim. ¹⁸ In Wilson v. Whittaker ¹⁹ the Supreme Court of Virginia described the nature of this single and exclusive right of action:

When a person is injured by the wrongful act of another and dies, the cause of action in the suit by his personal representative for death by wrongful act remains the same as that for his personal injuries. But the right of action for personal injuries does not survive the decedent. A new right of action is given decedent's personal representative only through the grace of legislative enactment.

We have held that in an action for wrongful death the personal representative of the deceased sues primarily as trustee for certain statutory beneficiaries and not for the general benefit of the decedent's estate. The object of the statute is to compensate these beneficiaries for their loss occasioned by the decedent's death. ²⁰

It is the policy and purpose of Virginia under this Act not to allow two actions in favor of the personal representative, one representing the estate and the other the beneficiaries, against the same defendant for the same wrong. Although Virginia does have a general survival statute, ²¹ the statute does not apply to wrongful death claims ²² and, hence, the survival statute does not provide an additional basis of recovery for wrongful death. Indeed, the availability of the wrongful death remedy in Virginia is predicated upon the non-availability of the survival remedy. ²³

In the instant case, the deceased was killed within the state of Virginia; the fatal force was administered within the state. The deceased was a Virginia resident, and plaintiff is a Virginia resident. However, defendants are residents of the District of Columbia, and their negligent supervision of the Virginia convict occurred within the District of Columbia. Plaintiff asserts that under these circumstances a Virginia court, using its modified "place of the wrong" approach, would apply Virginia substantive law in a wrongful death action, whereas a District of Columbia court, using "interest analysis", would apply District of Columbia substantive law. It is true that a Virginia court would apply Virginia law in this case; however, it is questionable that "interest analysis" would result in the application of District of Columbia law in a District of Columbia court. ²⁴ Nevertheless, for the purpose of argument, we will assume without deciding that a District of Columbia court would apply District law if the case was brought initially in the District.

Because wrongful death actions are transitory in nature, plaintiff in this case had the option of bringing an action in any court having subject matter jurisdiction and personal jurisdiction over the defendants, which here would encompass the state and federal courts in Virginia and the District of Columbia.

Had plaintiff initially brought suit in a local or federal District of Columbia court, then that court would have been free to apply District of Columbia law to the case, ²⁵ and, if it had, plaintiff would have been entitled to the recovery she presently seeks under the District's Wrongful Death Act and Survival Act. Plaintiff did not do this, however. Instead, she brought an action in federal court in Virginia specifically under the Virginia Wrongful...