Liability involving private correctional program providers is complex. For those who wish to delve into it further, this is Part 2 of a multipart presentation of case law on the subject gleaned from The Insurance Defense Blog and other legal sources online. Scroll through the opinion to see the highlighted decision sections.  Keep in mind the decision does not attribute liability on the part of the private correctional facility and its staff, it simply denies the defense request for summary judgement.  Grounds for denial were that the defendant private correctional group and defendants did owe a duty to the community and the plaintiff as a matter of law. Having said that it is clear this judgment should give pause to managers in private correctional contracts since they did not have any direct control over the offender at the time of the killing and a significant period of time had passed since they did. Their argument that there was no proximate cause was also rejected and should also give pause to private correctional managers as they assess the exposure of their entities, their management and staff.

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In Smith v. Hope Village, Inc., No. 05-633 (RBW)(D.D.C. Apr. 12, 2007), the district court denied the defendant’s motion for summary judgment, in which the defendant had argued in part that, as a matter of law, a halfway house owes no duty to unknown parties with whom it has no relationship for harm caused by an offender previously housed at the halfway house approximately five months prior to the offender’s harmful act.

An inmate named Kelly had been released from prison into the custody of the Hope Village halfway house in December, 2001.  (Although the opinion doesn’t say, the pleadings indicate that the date was Dec. 12, 2001).  On March 7, 2002, less than three months later, Kelly was discharged from Hope Village and was placed under the supervision of the DC Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency.  About five months after that, on August 6, 2002, Kelly allegedly broke into a house in Silver Spring where he shot and killed two people — one of whom was the plaintiff’s nine year old daughter.

Kelly had a long rap sheet with numerous felonies, including one involving a loaded gun.

Plaintiff brought a wrongful death and survival action against Hope Village.  The theory of liability was that Hope Village was negligent in its supervision of Kelly, and as a result, the halfway house was responsible for his improper and untimely release into the community.  Plaintiff alleged that Hope Village knew, or should have known, of Kelly’s violations of the terms of his conditional release while at Hope Village, yet it never disciplined him.

In its motion for summary judgment, Hope Village argued, among other things, that it does not owe any legally cognizable duty to the plaintiff, or to any parties with whom it has no pre-existing relationship, for injuries resulting from Kelly’s criminal conduct five months after he was discharged from the halfway house program.  It also argued that there was no proximate cause due to a lack of foreseeability, and due to remoteness and superseding and intervening negligence.

In a lengthy opinion, Judge Walton rejected all of Hope Village’s arguments, finding that Hope Village did owe a duty to people in the local community such as the plaintiff and her daughter, and that the question of foreseeability was for the jury. Judge Walton also reinstated plaintiff’s wrongful death claim, finding that the 3 year statute of limitations under the Maryland Wrongful Death Act applied, not the shorter period of limitations under the D.C. Act.

Full post as published by Insurance Defense Blog on May 06, 2007

Tags: cognizable duty, foreseeability, Liability, Private Correctional Facilities, Smith v. Hope Village

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 27th, 2009 at 5:16 pm and is filed under Criminal Justice Issues. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.