Opinion ID: 1182228
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Bommareddy v. Superior Court

Text: The Bommareddy court's interpretation of section 425.13(a) undermines the Legislature's intent to protect health care providers from unsubstantiated punitive damage claims. The court concluded that limiting the application of section 425.13(a) to causes of action for professional negligence would not render the section meaningless. It reasoned that punitive damages may be awarded on what is traditionally considered a negligence cause of action if the conduct amounts to despicable conduct carried on with conscious disregard of the safety of others. ( Bommareddy v. Superior Court, supra, 222 Cal. App.3d 1017, 1021.) The decision in Bommareddy rested, in part, on the comment by the Senate Committee on the Judiciary that stated, `There is substantial precedent for this bill. The provisions of the Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act of 1975 (MICRA) all pertain to claims of professional negligence.' ( Bommareddy v. Superior Court, supra, 222 Cal. App.3d at p. 1023.) The court deduced that as used in ... section 425.13[(a)], `professional negligence' is the same term of art as appears in the precedent MICRA legislation; there, the term has a specific meaning which does not include [an intentional tort] upon a patient. ( Bommareddy, supra, 222 Cal. App.3d at p. 1023.) As we explain, we disagree with the Bommareddy court's analysis. First, the Bommareddy court's reliance on legislative history analogizing MICRA statutes to section 425.13 is misplaced. The analysis erroneously focused on the relationship between professional negligence and intentional torts and held that the actions at issue were not subject to section 425.13. Whether professional negligence, as defined in MICRA statutes, includes intentional torts is not the question. Rather, the trial court must determine whether a plaintiff's action for damages is one  arising out of the professional negligence of a health care provider. (§ 425.13(a), italics added.) Based on the language of the statute and its legislative history, we conclude that an action for damages arises out of the professional negligence of a health care provider if the injury for which damages are sought is directly related to the professional services provided by the health care provider. Second, the Bommareddy interpretation of the legislative history leads to an anomalous result. (4) In construing legislative intent, it is fundamental that a statute should not be interpreted in a manner that would lead to absurd results. ( People v. Morris (1988) 46 Cal.3d 1, 15 [249 Cal. Rptr. 119, 756 P.2d 843].) If we were to accept the Bommareddy court's interpretation of 425.13(a), the section's protections would apply only to nonintentional tort conduct that gives rise to punitive damages. There are, however, few situations in which claims for punitive damages are predicated on mere negligence or a conscious disregard of the rights or safety of others and in which no intentional torts are alleged. (See, e.g., Taylor v. Superior Court (1979) 24 Cal.3d 890 [157 Cal. Rptr. 693, 598 P.2d 854].) (3b) An interpretation of the statute that would restrict its applicability to such a limited category of cases is inconsistent with the intention of the Legislature to protect health care providers from frequently pleaded and frivolous punitive damage claims. Contrary to the court's holding in Bommareddy v. Superior Court, supra, 222 Cal. App.3d 1017, such an interpretation would render the statute virtually meaningless. Moreover, under the Bommareddy court's reading of section 425.13(a), injured patients seeking punitive damages in an action involving professional negligence could readily assert that their health care providers committed an intentional tort and that the patients seek punitive damages only in connection with the intentional tort. By including a cause of action for an intentional tort in a negligence action, plaintiffs would sidestep section 425.13(a) and the resulting procedural requirements the Legislature sought to impose on them. Thus, the Bommareddy court's interpretation of section 425.13(a) effectively permits artful pleading to annul the protection afforded by that section. In sum, we conclude the Court of Appeal erred in Bommareddy, supra, 222 Cal. App.3d 1017, and accordingly we disapprove that case. We hold that whenever an injured party seeks punitive damages for an injury that is directly related to the professional services provided by a health care provider acting in its capacity as such, then the action is one arising out of the professional negligence of a health care provider, and the party must comply with section 425.13(a).