Opinion ID: 2077878
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: What effect, if any, did the 1994 amendments have on Wilkinson's classified full-status employment?

Text: The defendants argue that the 1994 amendments stripped Wilkinson of his classified full-status employment and that the General Assembly possessed the inherent authority to alter its prior policy by enacting such amendments. Moreover, defendants argue, the specific provisions of the 1994 amendments take precedence over the general provisions of the merit system. It is true that when statutes conflict, a later-enacted specific statute will be given effect over the earlier-passed general statute. See § 43-3-26 (requiring the harmonization of statutes, but if that is not possible, then the specific statute trumps the general statute). This Court, however, long has held that statutes and their amendments are applied prospectively. Lawrence v. Anheuser  Busch, Inc., 523 A.2d 864, 869 (R.I.1987). (Emphasis added.) From and after the effective date of the 1994 amendments, all crime lab jobs were converted into so-called limited-appointment positions subject to URI's employment rules and practices. But government employees like Wilkinson who already had achieved classified full status under the merit system did not lose that classified full status merely because a position they held after achieving full status became a limited-term appointment on the effective date of the statutory amendment. The terms of particular crime-lab jobs may well have come to an end as of the result of the 1994 amendments, but Wilkinson's classified full-status protection under the merit system survived those changes. Only when `it appears by clear, strong language or by necessary implication that the Legislature intended' a statute to have retroactive application will the courts apply it retrospectively. Hydro-Manufacturing, Inc. v. Kayser-Roth Corp., 640 A.2d 950, 954-55 (R.I.1994) (quoting VanMarter v. Royal Indemnity Co., 556 A.2d 41, 44 (R.I.1989)). Here, no specific language in the 1994 amendments supports defendants' position that these enactments retroactively stripped Wilkinson of his full-status employment. In the absence of such language, or indeed any evidence to the contrary, this Court will apply the general rule that statutes operate prospectively from and after the effective date of the statute. It is only in the event that a statute contains clear and explicit language requiring retroactive application that a statute will be interpreted to operate retrospectively. Avanzo v. Rhode Island Department of Human Services, 625 A.2d 208, 211 (R.I.1993) (holding that attempt by governmental entity to apply a statute changing welfare eligibility requirements by establishing a limit on the length of time a totally incapacitated adult might receive benefits should not have been applied to existing recipients by counting benefit months prior to the effective date of the statute). Thus, the 1994 amendments affecting the status of crime lab employees are valid only for those employees who had not obtained a protected property interest in their full-status employment before the 1994 amendments. There is, therefore, no conflict between the 1994 amendments and the merit system necessitating the application of the trumping provision of § 43-3-26. The defendants also argue that, since 1971, Wilkinson always has been a nonclassified limited-term appointee under URI's employment policies and practices. This contention, however, completely ignores the District Court's ruling to the contrary in Wilkinson's 1993 appeal that reversed DES's refusal to award him unemployment compensation. This Court has held that the doctrine of collateral estoppel prevents the re-litigation of an issue actually litigated and determined between the same parties or their privies. Casco Indemnity Co. v. O'Connor, 755 A.2d 779, 782 (R.I.2000). [F]or collateral estoppel to apply, three factors must be present: `there must be an identity of issues; the prior proceeding must have resulted in a final judgment on the merits; and the party against whom the collateral estoppel is sought must be the same as or in privity with the party in the prior proceeding.' Id. (quoting Commercial Union Insurance Co. v. Pelchat, 727 A.2d 676, 680 (R.I. 1999)). All three of these elements are satisfied in this case. The defendants were parties to Wilkinson's action seeking unemployment compensation; at issue was what government entity actually employed Wilkinson, and what was his actual government-employment status. Finally, defendants, as they acknowledged at oral argument, never sought further review of the District Court's final judgment holding that Wilkinson was a commission employee who had achieved full-status protection in his job. Therefore, this Court will not entertain arguments concerning what entity employed Wilkinson or what type of state employment he held. As determined in the earlier District Court action, Wilkinson was never a URI employee, but was at all times a classified commission employee who had achieved full status or tenure in his job. Moreover, defendants' counterclaims for reimbursement of tuition benefits and compensation were based on Wilkinson's status as a classified employee of the commission, at least from 1978-1994. Because of the preclusive effect of the District Court's final judgment, and the tacit waiver of this issue in defendants' briefs, the Court will not, at this late date, entertain reargument on an issue that already has been decided and that defendants apparently have conceded. Moreover, we are in complete agreement with the District Court's interpretation of the applicable statute. Under the original crime lab act, Wilkinson was a classified employee of the commission, but not URI. In sum, we hold that Wilkinson's classified full-status employment was not affected by the 1994 amendments. When he achieved this status in 1988, Wilkinson obtained a property interest in hiscontinued employment with the commission such that he could not be terminated from state service except for cause, nor could he be reorganized into a different limited-term classification without paying him just compensation for taking his protected property interest in his full-status employment. Thus, when defendants declined to reappoint Wilkinson to a limited-term position in 1996 and refused to retain him as a classified full-status state employee, they violated the merit system, which prohibited them from dismissing Wilkinson from state service without cause to do so. Thus, as a matter of law, Wilkinson was entitled to a grant of summary judgment on this claim, and we vacate so much of the motion justice's summary judgment that is inconsistent with this determination.