Opinion ID: 1532348
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Deprivation of Due Process of Law Claims

Text: In Johnson, we addressed claims of due process violations identical to those presented in the present case. Like Petitioner in the case at bar, the claimants in Johnson relied primarily on the decision of the Supreme Court of Michigan in Grubaugh v. City of St. Johns, 384 Mich. 165, 180 N.W.2d 778 (1970). Johnson, 331 Md. at 298, 628 A.2d at 168. The court in Grubaugh held that a 60-day administrative claim requirement, which was a condition for bringing a tort suit against a governmental entity, was, as applied to minors, a violation of substantive due process. Grubaugh, 180 N.W.2d at 783-84. The Grubaugh opinion was based on several premises, including that the waiver of governmental immunity was intended to put governmental entities on the same level as private tortfeasors, that the plaintiff had a vested property right in a tort cause of action against the tortfeasor, and that the administrative claim requirement was arbitrary. Id. Thus, the Grubaugh court concluded that the claim requirement represented an arbitrary infringement on the plaintiff's vested property right and thus was a violation of substantive due process. Id. at 784. Judge Eldridge, writing for this Court, in Johnson, however, rejected the Grubaugh reasoning, stating, [A] conditional or partial waiver of sovereign immunity certainly is not intended to put governmental entities on exactly the same footing as private tortfeasors. Johnson, 331 Md. at 298, 628 A.2d at 168. Moreover, we stated that we cannot agree that there is a constitutionally protected vested property right in a particular common law tort cause of action, id. at 298-99, 628 A.2d at 168, nor did we consider the administrative claims requirement as arbitrary or unreasonable based upon our discussion of the plaintiffs' other constitutional claims. Id. at 299, 628 A.2d at 169. We continue to remain unconvinced by the reasoning explicated in Grubaugh. The LGTCA cannot be considered to have been intended to put local governments participating in governmental activities on the same footing as private tortfeasors, as the LGTCA only requires local governments to defend and indemnify their employees if the provisions of the LGTCA are satisfied. Furthermore, we continue to adhere to the view that under the circumstances of the case at bar it is not possible to have a property interest in a cause of action arising out of a common law tort. Johnson, 331 Md. at 298-99, 628 A.2d at 168; Murphy, 325 Md. at 362-64, 601 A.2d at 112, quoting Duke Power Co. v. Carolina Env. Study Group, 438 U.S. 59, 88 n. 32, 98 S.Ct. 2620, 2638 n. 32, 57 L.Ed.2d 595, 620 n. 32 (1978) ([o]ur cases have clearly established that `[a] person has no property, no vested interest, in any rule of the common law'). We determine, therefore, that the notice requirement of the LGTCA does not act to deprive Petitioner of a vested property interest without due process of law.