Court Opinion

ID: 9590737
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:58:03.107544+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:37:31.020155
License: Public Domain

Judge WELLS
dissenting in part.
One aspect of the majority opinion disturbs me. In the context of the Sec. 1983 claim for monetary damages, based on denial of due process, the trial court charged the jury that the bias of one member of the Board was sufficient to establish that plaintiff had been denied due process. The majority opinion approves that instruction, and in doing so expresses its accord with the view expressed by the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in Berkshire Employees Association v. NLRB as follows:
‘The Board argues that at worst the evidence only shows that one member of the body making the adjudication was not in a position to judge impartially. We deem this answer insufficient. Litigants are entitled to an impartial tribunal whether it consists of one [person] or twenty and there is no way which we know of whereby the influence of one upon the others can be quantitatively measured.’
The Third Circuit Court in that case remanded the matter for a determination of whether a member of the Board was disqualified because of bias, and, if so, to grant plaintiff a new hearing by Board members not so disqualified.
I regard the implication of that case as vastly different from the case now before us, where the result of the trial court’s instruction allowed the jury to hold the entire Board answerable in damages because of the bias of a single member. In a due process context, this result appears to be somewhat incongruous, if not bizarre.
I agree with defendant that a correct instruction on bias would specify that the jury had to find that such (impermissible) bias infected a majority of the Board members. I disagree with the statement of the Third Circuit Court that “there is no way which *191. . . the influence of one upon the others can be quantitatively measured. ...” I know no reason why a jury could not as satisfactorily sort out this kind of evidentiary challenge as well as they are regularly called upon to do in complex or difficult cases.
I perceive that the balancing process at stake here is fraught with difficulty: the entitlement of plaintiff to a fair hearing on his discharge versus the entitlement of defendant to a fair trial in this case. It appears unfair to me to hold the whole Board responsible in damages for the bias of a sole member. I therefore respectfully dissent on this issue, and I vote to award defendant a new trial.