Opinion ID: 8414594
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Miracle’s governmental-immunity defense

Text: The other issue on appeal concerns the district court’s holding with respect to Hill’s state-law claim for assault and battery. Under Michigan law, “[a]n assault is defined as any intentional unlawful offer of corporal injury to another person by force, or force unlawfully directed toward the person of another, under circumstances which create a well-founded apprehension of imminent contact, coupled with the apparent present ability to accomplish the contact.” Espinoza v. Thomas, 189 Mich.App. 110, 472 N.W.2d 16, 21 (1991). “A battery is the willful and harmful or offensive touching of another person which results from an act intended to cause such a contact.” Id. Miracle argues that the court erred in concluding that he was not entitled to governmental immunity with respect to Hill’s assault-and-battery claim. As metaphorically noted above, the district court failed to see the forest for the trees in the qualified-immunity context. In the governmental-immunity context under Michigan law, the court failed to even see the trees. We say this because the court applied the wrong standard in assessing Miracle’s governmental-immunity defense. It applied the standard set forth in Brewer v. Perrin, 132 Mich.App. 520, 349 N.W.2d 198, 202 (1984), stating that “a governmental officer’s actions that would normally constitute intentional torts are shielded from liability if those actions are justified because they were objectively reasonable under the circumstances.” Estate of Corey Hill, 2016 WL 3136066, at . But the Michigan Supreme Court repudiated this standard in Odom v. Wayne County, 482 Mich. 459, 760 N.W.2d 217 (2008). In Odom, the Court noted that the area of law dealing with governmental immunity had “fallen into disarray” and sought to clarify the contours of the defense for intentional-tort claims. Id. at 220. The Michigan Supreme Court in Odom held that a defendant did not need to show that his actions were “justified” or “objectively reasonable under the circumstances” in order to qualify for governmental immunity. Id. at 220, 229. Instead, an officer who commits an intentional tort is entitled to governmental immunity if he shows that “(a) the acts were undertaken during the course of employment and the employee was acting, or reasonably believed that he was acting, within the scope of his authority, (b) the acts were undertaken in good faith, or were not undertaken with malice, and (c) the acts were discretionary, as opposed to ministerial.” Id. at 228. We can again understand how the district court might have been led astray by a number of cases decided after Odom, particularly arising out of the federal district courts in Michigan, that continue to cite and apply the standard for governmental immunity articulated in Brewer. See, e.g., Parchman v. Taylor, No. 12-CV-13094, 2015 WL 265069, at  (E.D. Mich. Jan 21, 2015). Unfortunately, neither party was helpful in pointing the court to Odom and instead just discussed Brewer. But both sides conceded at oral argument before us (in response to our pointed inquiry) that Odom is the controlling authority. Under these circumstances, we would ordinarily remand the case for the district court to reconsider the governmental-immunity defense under the proper standard. See Pullman-Standard v. Swint, 456 U.S. 273, 291, 102 S.Ct. 1781, 72 L.Ed.2d 66 (1982) (holding that “[w]hen an appellate court discerns that a district court has failed to make a finding because of an erroneous view of the law, the usual rule is that there should be a remand for further proceedings to permit the trial court to make the missing findings”). But such a remand would be a waste of judicial resources in the present case. For the same reasons set forth above in the context of Miracle’s qualified-immunity defense, we conclude that no reasonable jury would find that he acted in bad faith, much less that malice was a factor. See id. at 292, 102 S.Ct. 1781 (holding that, even where the district court’s “findings are infirm because of an erroneous view of the law,” a remand is unnecessary if “the record permits only one resolution of the factual issue”). The record here reflects that Miracle acted in an objectively reasonable manner with the minimum force necessary to bring Hill under control, and his actions enabled the paramedics to save Hill’s life. Miracle is therefore entitled to governmental immunity on Hill’s state-law claim of assault and battery.