Opinion ID: 4304527
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Overview of Statutory Analysis

Text: “We provide judicial deference to the policy decisions enacted into law by the General Assembly.” Phillips v. State, 451 Md. 180, 196 (2017). In addition, this Court “assume[s] that the legislature’s intent is expressed in the statutory language and thus our statutory interpretation focuses primarily on the language of the statute to determine the purpose and intent of the General Assembly.” Id. This Court recently had the opportunity to reiterate the statutory interpretation process: 14 When conducting a statutory construction analysis, this Court’s principal goal is to determine the legislative intent underlying the relevant statutes. See Downes v. Downes, 388 Md. 561, 571 (2005). “We begin our analysis by looking to the normal, plain meaning of the language of the statute, reading the statute as a whole to ensure that no word, clause, sentence or phrase is rendered surplusage, superfluous, meaningless or nugatory.” Brown v. State, 454 Md. 546, 551 (2017). Shealer v. Straka, 459 Md. 68, 84 (2018). We will not “read a statute in a way that is inconsistent with, or ignores, common sense or logic.” Md. Pub. Serv. Comm’n, 355 Md. at 23 (citing Frost v. State, 336 Md. 125, 137 (1994)). Continuing our discussion of statutory interpretation in Shealer, we stated that: In some instances, a reviewing court will be able to discern the legislative intent from the clear and unambiguous statutory language; nevertheless, “[o]ccasionally we see fit to examine extrinsic sources of legislative intent merely as a check of our reading of a statute’s plain language.” Reger [v. Washington Ctny. Bd. of Ed.], 455 Md. [68,] 96 [(2017)] (quoting Phillips [v. State], 451 Md. [180,] 196 [(2017)]). The key extrinsic source for purposes of confirming the legislative intent is often the legislative history of the pertinent statutes. See State v. Roshchin, 446 Md. 128, 140 (2016) (“But even when the language is unambiguous, it is useful to review legislative history of the statute to confirm that interpretation and to eliminate another version of legislative intent alleged to be latent in the language.”). Shealer, 459 Md. at 84.