Opinion ID: 853842
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Commission's Authority to Award Damages

Text: After finding that the Alders committed unlawful discriminatory practices, the Commission ordered the Alders to pay compensatory, emotional distress and punitive damages to Stovall and Jackson. The Alders argue that the Commission exceeded its statutory authority in awarding emotional distress and punitive damages to Jackson and Stovall. The Civil Rights Law provides that, as a remedy for discriminatory behavior, the Commission may require a person to take further affirmative action as will effectuate the purpose of this chapter, including but not limited to the power: (A) to restore the complainant's losses incurred as a result of discriminatory treatment, as the commission may deem necessary to assure justice. . . . IND.CODE § 22-9-1-6(k)(A) (1998). In construing a statute, our primary goal is to determine the intent of the General Assembly. Smith v. State, 675 N.E.2d 693, 696 (Ind.1996); Spaulding v. International Bakers Serv., Inc., 550 N.E.2d 307, 309 (Ind. 1990). To this end, we give words their common and ordinary meaning. Spaulding, 550 N.E.2d at 309.
The General Assembly explicitly authorized the Commission to restore the complainant's losses incurred as a result of discriminatory treatment in fashioning a remedy under the Civil Rights Law. A plain reading of this language permits the Commission to award damages to compensate for both economic and emotional distress losses. The statute does not purport to limit the scope of losses to economic losses as it does for employment discrimination cases. See Indiana Civil Rights Comm'n v. Midwest Steel, 450 N.E.2d 130, 140-41 (Ind.Ct. App.1983) (award in employment cases limited to wages, salary or commission under Indiana Code § 22-9-1-6(k)(A)). Instead, the statute's use of the broad term losses incurred as a result of discrimination permits the Commission to award an amount of damages that will make a victim of discrimination whole. Accordingly, we agree with Judge Rucker's dissent that the plain, everyday, and common meaning of the term losses includes emotional distress damages. See Indiana Civil Rights Comm'n v. Alder, 689 N.E.2d 1274, 1281 (Ind.Ct.App.1997) (Rucker, J., dissenting); see also Indiana Civil Rights Comm'n v. Washburn Realtors, Inc., 610 N.E.2d 293, 297-99 (Ind.Ct.App. 1993) (Rucker, J., dissenting). This result is consistent with other jurisdictions permitting civil rights agencies to compensate victims for both economic and emotional distress losses, see Donald T. Kramer, ed., Annotation, Recovery of Damages as Remedy for Wrongful Discrimination Under State or Local Civil Rights Provisions, 85 A.L.R.3d 351, 374 § 8 (1978) (collecting cases), and federal decisions under the Fair Housing Act which permits an Administrative Law Judge to award actual damages suffered by aggrieved person. See, e.g., Secretary, HUD on Behalf of Herron v. Blackwell, 908 F.2d 864 (11th Cir. 1990) (upholding damage awards for economic losses and emotional distress); Phillips v. Hunter Trails Community Ass'n, 685 F.2d 184 (7th Cir.1982) (reducing award for emotional distress to $10,000 for each plaintiff and approving $2,675 in actual expenditures). The Commission did not exceed its statutory authority in awarding damages for emotional distress.
The Commission also ordered the Alders to pay Jackson $100 and Stovall $200 for punitive damages. The Appellants urge a broad reading of losses incurred to support the award of punitive damages. As explained above, losses includes any injury, economic or emotional, suffered as a result of the discrimination. However, the purpose of punitive damages is not to compensate for injury, and punitive damages do not compensate a loss of the claimant. Rather, punitive damages are designed to penalize or punish or deter the defendant. See Carroll v. Statesman Ins. Co., 509 N.E.2d 825 (Ind. 1987); see also 22 AM.JUR.2D Damages § 733 (1988). Moreover, as a general matter, punitive damages require explicit statutory authorization if they are to be recovered under a statutory cause of action. 22 AM.JUR.2D Damages § 737 (1988). The plain language of the Civil Rights Law simply does not authorize the Commission to award punitive damages. Particularly in awards authorized to be made by an agency rather than a court, we would not infer authority to award punitive damages in the absence of clear legislative language to that effect.