Opinion ID: 433398
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Ad Damnum Clause

Text: 32 The district court erred in granting plaintiff's motion to amend the ad damnum clause. As a jurisdictional prerequisite to a suit under the FTCA an administrative claim must be filed with the appropriate federal agency before an action may be commenced against the United States. 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2675(a). See also Adams v. United States, 615 F.2d 284, 286 (5th Cir.1980); Kielwien v. United States, 540 F.2d 676, 679 (4th Cir.), cert. denied, 429 U.S. 979, 97 S.Ct. 491, 50 L.Ed.2d 588 (1976). Section 2675(b) provides further that: 33 Action under this section shall not be instituted for any sum in excess of the amount of the claim presented to the federal agency, except where the increased amount is based upon newly discovered evidence not reasonably discoverable at the time of presenting the claim to the federal agency, or upon allegation and proof of intervening facts, relating to the amount of the claim. 34 (Emphasis added). 35 Shortly before trial plaintiff moved pursuant to Sec. 2675(b) to increase the ad damnum clause from $925,000 to $1,400,000. Plaintiff asserted that, in the six years since it filed the administrative claim, an unprecedented rise had occurred in the salaries paid to Greek captains and mates. Finding that this circumstance constituted an intervening fact within the meaning of Sec. 2675(b), the court granted plaintiff's motion. 36 Under the circumstances of this case, however, the motion should not have been granted. While this is our first opportunity to examine Sec. 2675(b), other courts that have ruled on the scope of this section have granted motions to amend ad damnum clauses only when an unexpected change occurred either in the law or in a medical diagnosis. For example, in Husovsky v. United States, 590 F.2d 944, 955 (D.C.Cir.1978), the court held that a changed medical diagnosis predicting an increased life span constituted an intervening fact where sufficient evidence supported the inference that the amount of the original claim was based on plaintiff's life expectancy at the time the claim was filed and the increased damage award was sought on the basis of this change. In Funston v. United States, 513 F.Supp. 1000 (M.D.Pa.1981), the district court held that the unpredicted adoption by the state supreme court of a new method of discounting the present value of lost future earnings constituted an intervening fact. The court granted plaintiff's motion to increase the ad damnum clause, but only to the extent that the increase is applicable to the fact that in submitting the administrative claim Plaintiff discounted his request for lost future earnings as required by then applicable law. Id. at 1007. See also McDonald v. United States, 555 F.Supp. 935, 957-62 (M.D.Pa.1983); Gallimore v. United States, 530 F.Supp. 136 (E.D.Pa.1982). 37 In all of these cases, there was some indication that the amount of the original claim was calculated on the basis of known facts at the time of the filing and that, subsequently, some new and previously unforeseen information came to light. Here, no such showing has been made. Although it is uncontroverted that the salaries of Greek seamen increased dramatically during the intervening six years, plaintiff does not claim that this was unforeseen. More important, he failed to assert sufficient concrete facts demonstrating that he relied on the old salary structure data in the calculation of his original $925,000 claim. 38 The FTCA, as a statute waiving sovereign immunity, must be complied with strictly. See United States v. Kubrick, 444 U.S. 111, 117-18, 100 S.Ct. 352, 356-57, 62 L.Ed.2d 259 (1979). If plaintiff were allowed to amend his ad damnum clause based upon the minimal showing he made in the district court, we would, in effect, be substituting the liberal pleading requirements of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15 for the narrower requirements of Sec. 2675(b). This we may not do. See Kubrick, supra. Accordingly, we hold that the district court erred in granting plaintiff's motion to amend the ad damnum clause.