Court Opinion

ID: 9575595
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:15:12.473457+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:48:35.658340
License: Public Domain

HUMPHREYS, Judge.
The Board for Asbestos and Lead of the Department of Professional and Occupational Regulation (the “Board”) appeals from a decision of the Circuit Court of the City of Hopewell reversing the Board’s decision to impose a fine on Abateco Services, Inc. (“Abateco”) for refusing to provide the Department of Labor and Industry (the “Department”) access to its records. The Board contends the trial court erred in finding that: (1) Abateco did not violate an existing state or federal standard regarding asbestos removal; (2) a state or federal standard did not exist at the time of the violation; (3) Abateco acted in good faith and, therefore, any violation was not willful; and (4) the fine imposed by the Board violated the Excessive Fines clauses of both the United States and Virginia Constitutions. In addition, Abateco appeals the trial court’s denial of its request for attorneys’ fees. We consolidated these appeals and, for the reasons that follow, we affirm in part and reverse in part and remand.
I. BACKGROUND
In November, 1994 Abateco was under contract to remove insulation containing asbestos from the Staunton Correctional Center, a facility owned and operated by the Virginia Department of Corrections. The contractual arrangement between Abateco and the Commonwealth required Abateco to keep certain records regarding asbestos removal and to produce the records on demand by state regulators. In addition to the contractual arrangement, various regulations adopted by the Department required that these records be maintained and produced upon demand.1
*477On November 22, 1994, an inspector from the Department requested certain records from Abateco, including employee medical records, employee asbestos training, employee exposure to asbestos, and a hazard communications document. After consulting with its counsel, Abateco refused to produce the documents in the absence of a search warrant, citing its privacy rights under the Fourth Amendment.
As a result of its refusal to provide the requested records, the Commissioner of the Department issued a citation and notification of penalty to Abateco, proposing a civil penalty totaling $20,000. Abateco appealed the penalty assessment to the Circuit Court of the City of Staunton. The trial court found Abateco guilty of four willful violations of the health and safety standards, and it assessed a total penalty of $9,665. We affirmed that decision in Abateco Services, Inc. v. Bell, 23 Va.App. 504, 477 S.E.2d 795 (1996).
Following our decision, the Board notified Abateco that its failure to meet applicable state or federal standards when performing an asbestos project also constituted grounds for additional disciplinary action by the Board pursuant to Code § 54.1-516(A)(3) and Asbestos Licensing Program Regulation 13.6.A.1. See 18 VAC 15-20-450. The matter was referred for an informal conference pursuant to Code § 9-6.14:11. In his proposed findings of fact, the hearing officer found that Abateco acted in good faith reliance on the advice of counsel in refusing to provide the records. The hearing officer further found no federal or state standard relating to Abateco’s right to demand a search or inspection warrant at the time of the violations.
The Board adopted the facts in the hearing officer’s report, but found clear and convincing evidence that Abateco had failed to meet applicable state standards and had willfully violated Code § 54.1-516(A)(3). The Board also found Abateco failed to meet state standards in violation of Asbestos *478Licensing Program Regulation 13.6.A.1. See 18 VAC 15-20-450. The Board imposed a sixty-day inoperative suspension of Abateco’s license and a $2,000 fine.
Abateco appealed the Board’s decision to the Circuit Court of the City of Hopewell, pursuant to the Virginia Administrative Process Act.2 Abateco also requested an award of its attorneys’ fees. By letter opinion, the trial court reversed the Board’s judgment and vacated the suspension and fine. The trial court also denied Abateco’s request for attorneys’ fees. These appeals followed.
II. VIOLATION OF AN EXISTING STATE STANDARD
Because the issues are interconnected, we consider together the Board’s arguments that the trial court erred in reversing the Board’s finding that Abateco violated an existing federal or state standard and that the trial court erred in finding that no federal or state standard existed. Abateco successfully argued below that it did not violate any state or federal standard based on our previous holding that Abateco contractually consented to access to its records without the requirement of a warrant. See Abateco, 23 Va.App. at 518, 477 S.E.2d at 801-02. Abateco contends this holding left open the issue of whether the records would have been available without a search warrant. Abateco does not dispute that the regulations promulgated by the Board existed on November 22, 1996, but contends the regulations were not enforceable unless and until we determined whether, absent a waiver, a search or inspection warrant was required pursuant to Code §§ 40.1-49.8 and 40.1-49.9.
We find this argument unpersuasive. In reviewing an agency decision, the trial court must determine: (1) whether the agency acted in accordance with law; (2) whether the agency made a procedural error which was not harmless error; and (3) whether the agency had sufficient evidential *479support for its findings of fact. See Johnston-Willis v. Kenley, 6 Va.App. 231, 242, 369 S.E.2d 1, 7 (1988).
Whether a warrant is necessary is a legal, procedural issue, not a safety and health standard. The level of deference accorded to an agency decision depends upon the nature of the question involved. “[W]here the question involves an interpretation which is within the specialized competence of the agency and the agency has been entrusted with wide discretion by the General Assembly, the agency’s decision is entitled to special weight in the courts.” Id. at 244, 369 S.E.2d at 8. Heightened deference is not required where the issue is one in which the courts have a special competence. See id. at 243-44, 369 S.E.2d at 7-8. “Thus, where the legal issues require a determination by the reviewing court whether an agency has, for example, accorded constitutional rights, failed to comply with statutory authority, or failed to observe required procedures, less deference is required____” Id. at 243, 369 S.E.2d at 7-8.
Based upon this standard of review, we find that a safety and health standard existed that required the production on demand of the required records. The issue of whether Abateco could interpose any protection under the Fourth Amendment to require a warrant is a legal issue, falling outside the specialized competence of the Board. Therefore, “little deference [wa]s required to be accorded the [Board’s] decision” by the trial court. Id. at 246, 369 S.E.2d at 9.
However, the trial court was bound to apply our prior finding that Abateco contractually consented to produce the records on demand and without requiring a warrant. See Abateco, 23 Va.App. at 518, 477 S.E.2d at 801-02. Therefore, the trial court erred in reversing the Board’s findings that standards existed requiring the production of certain records and that Abateco violated these standards.
III. GOOD FAITH AS NEGATING A WILLFUL VIOLATION
We previously affirmed a finding on these facts by the Circuit Court of the City of Staunton that Abateco’s refusal to *480produce the records constituted a willful violation of Code § 40.1-51.21. See Abateco, 23 Va.App. at 518, 477 S.E.2d at 802. Nevertheless, Abateco argued, and the trial court agreed, that the hearing officer’s finding that Abateco acted “in good faith reliance on the advice of counsel,” when adopted by reference by the Board in its final order, negates any legal conclusion that Abateco acted willfully to violate such state standards. We disagree.
“Good faith” and “willfulness” are not mutually exclusive terms. An act is deemed to have been committed in good faith if it is done honestly and without fraud or deceit. See Lawton v. Walker, 231 Va. 247, 251, 343 S.E.2d 335, 337-38 (1986). “[C]onduct is ‘willful’ when it is intentional.” Angstadt v. Atlantic Mut. Ins. Co., 254 Va. 286, 293, 492 S.E.2d 118, 122 (1997) (quoting RF & P Corp. v. Little, 247 Va. 309, 320, 440 S.E.2d 908, 915 (1994)). The word “willful” also has been defined, in a non-criminal law context, as denoting an act that is intentional, knowing, or voluntary. See United States v. Murdock, 290 U.S. 389, 394, 54 S.Ct. 223, 225, 78 L.Ed. 381 (1933), overruled in part, on other grounds, by Murphy v. Waterfront Comm’n, 378 U.S. 52, 84 S.Ct. 1594, 12 L.Ed.2d 678 (1964). In the context of the federal Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA), “willful” has been defined as “‘an intentional disregard of, or plain indifference to, OSHA requirements.’ ” Reich v. Trinity Indus., Inc., 16 F.3d 1149, 1152 (11th Cir.1994) (citation omitted). An employer’s good faith belief is irrelevant to the question of whether an employer “willfully” violated the law. Id. at 1154. Thus, regardless of whether Abateco could constitutionally demand that the Board obtain a warrant to conduct an inspection of the records upon its premises, Abateco was required by VOSHA regulations and contract to provide the Board access to its employees’ medical and health records and refusing to provide access to these records was a willful violation of these standards.
The trial court’s letter opinion does not indicate the weight the trial court gave to its finding of good faith when deciding to reverse the Board’s finding that Abateco’s conduct was “willful.” However, we hold that, to the extent the trial court *481determined that the finding of good faith on the part of Abateco necessarily required the trial court to set aside the factual finding of the Board that Abateco’s conduct was “willful,” for the reasons stated herein, this determination was erroneous.
IV. EXCESSIVE FINES
The Board argues that the trial court erred in finding that the $2,000 fine imposed by the Board was excessive under the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States and Article I, § 9 of the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia.
Abateco argues the $2,000 fine imposed by the Board was unconstitutionally excessive because Abateco had previously been sufficiently punished by a fine imposed by the Department. In other words, Abateco suggests that multiple civil penalties imposed by different regulatory authorities for the same conduct are unconstitutionally excessive, regardless of the amount of the penalties.
As the Board noted, there is no Virginia case law applying the excessive fines provision of Article I, § 9 of the Constitution of Virginia to a situation where multiple state agencies have imposed civil penalties for the same conduct. In a criminal context, the Supreme Court of Virginia has stated that in order to violate this constitutional provision, a punishment must “in quantum ... be so out of proportion to the crime as to shock the conscience.... ” Hart v. Commonwealth, 131 Va. 726, 745, 109 S.E. 582, 588 (1921).
The Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution is modeled on and congruent with its companion clause in the Constitution of Virginia. See Solem v. Helm, 463 U.S. 277, 285 n. 10, 103 S.Ct. 3001, 3007 n. 10, 77 L.Ed.2d 637 (1983). These constitutional provisions are based upon the principle that punishment should be proportionate to the crime. The Magna Carta itself provided that “ ‘[a] free man shall not be fined for a small offence, except in proportion to the measure of the offence; and for a great offence he shall be fined in *482proportion to the magnitude of the offence, saving his freehold____’ Art. 20.” Harmelin v. Michigan, 501 U.S. 957, 967, 111 S.Ct. 2680, 2687, 115 L.Ed.2d 836 (1991) (citation omitted).
In Solem, Justice Powell traced the antecedents of the protection from excessive fines and cruel and unusual punishment from the Magna Carta through the First Statute of Westminster, 3 Edw. I, ch. 6 (1275), the English Bill of Rights, The Virginia Declaration of Rights, authored by George Mason in 1776, to the Eighth Amendment. See Solem, 463 U.S. at 284-85, 103 S.Ct. at 3006-07. The Virginia Declaration of Rights still lives as Article I of the Constitution of Virginia.
When the framers of the Virginia Declaration of Rights and the Eighth Amendment adopted the provision prohibiting excessive fines and cruel and unusual punishment embodied in the English Declaration of Rights, they were simply adopting the principle that the punishment should not be disproportionate to the crime.3
Abateeo has not raised any issue of former jeopardy. Indeed, in its argument, Abateeo cites Smolka v. Second Dist. Committee, 224 Va. 161, 165, 295 S.E.2d 267, 269 (1982), and concedes the authority of both the Board and the Commissioner of the Department to regulate the company.4 Furthermore, Abateeo cites no authority for a construction of the Excessive Fines clause that prohibits the imposition of civil sanctions by multiple regulatory authorities, and we have found no such authority.
*483In examining a punishment for unconstitutional excessiveness vis-a-vis the Eighth Amendment in a criminal context, the United States Supreme Court has noted two relevant factors the courts must bear in mind: (1) judgments about the appropriate punishment belong, in the first instance, to the legislature, and (2) any judicial determination regarding the gravity of a particular offense will be inherently imprecise. See United States v. Bajakajian, 524 U.S. 321, 336, 118 S.Ct. 2028, 2037, 141 L.Ed.2d 314 (1998). Against the backdrop of these considerations, the United States Supreme Court adopted the standard of “gross disproportionality” articulated in its Cruel and Unusual Punishment precedents. Id. In simple terms, if the punishment is grossly disproportional to the offense, given its nature and the actual or potential harm involved, such punishment is unconstitutional. We find this approach to be reasonable and adopt a similar standard for the construction of Article I, § 9 of the Constitution of Virginia.
In applying this standard to the facts of this case, we repeat our earlier observations with respect to the context of Abateeo’s conduct: “[a]sbestos removal is a highly regulated industry in Virginia. Asbestos removal and asbestos disposal present health and safety hazards to the public and in the workplace.” Abateco, 23 Va. App. at 513, 477 S.E.2d at 799.
In addition to Code § 40.1-51.22, authorizing the Department’s imposition of fines for violations, the General Assembly has authorized further sanctions imposed by the Board for willful violations of state or federal standards. See Code § 54.1-517. The $2,000 civil penalty imposed by the Board, even when combined with the fine imposed by the Department, is well below the maximum amount authorized by the General Assembly that could have been imposed in this case. See Code §§ 40.1-51.22 and 54.1-517. We find that the additional penalty imposed on Abateco by the Board was not grossly disproportional to the offenses committed by Abateco, and the imposition of the Board’s penalty does not offend either the Virginia or United States Constitutions.
*484V. ATTORNEY’S FEES
Abateco appeals the trial court’s denial of its application for reasonable attorney’s fees pursuant to Code § 9-6.14:21(A).5 Because Abateco did not substantially prevail on the merits, and because we find no evidence that the Board’s position was “not substantially justified,” we find no error in the failure of the trial court to award attorney’s fees.
Accordingly, we affirm the decision of the trial court with respect to attorney’s fees and reverse and remand with respect to the remaining issues for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

Affirmed as to Record Number 1780-99-2.

Reversed and remanded as to Record Number 1719-99-2.

. Virginia Occupational Safety and Health Standards §§ 1926.58(k)(4)(ii), 1926.58(m), 1926.58(n)(5)(ii), 1926.58(n)(5)(iii), *4771926.59(e)(4). See 16 VAC 25-175-1926 (adopting the federal Occupational Safety and Health Act ("OSHA”) standards and regulations).

. Code § 9-6.14:1 et seq.

. The English Bill of Rights provided in pertinent part "excessive Bail ought not to be required, nor excessive Fines imposed; nor cruel and unusual Punishments inflicted.” An Act Declaring the Rights and Liberties of the Subject, and Settling the Succession of the Crown, 1 W. & M. 2, ch. 2 (1689) (Eng.).

. The constitutional double jeopardy argument in the context of civil penalties imposed by multiple regulatory agencies has also been rejected by the federal courts. See Jones v. Sec. & Exch. Comm'n, 115 F.3d 1173, 1183 (4th Cir.1997), cert. denied, 523 U.S. 1072, 118 S.Ct. 1512, 140 L.Ed.2d 666 (1998).

. Code § 9-6.14:21(A) provides:
In any civil case brought under Article 4 (§ 9-6.14:15 et seq.) of this chapter and § 9-6.14:4.1, in which any person contests any agency action, as defined in § 9-6.14:4, such person shall be entitled to recover from that agency ..., reasonable costs and attorney fees if such person substantially prevails on the merits of the case and the agency’s position is not substantially justified, unless special circumstances would make an award unjust. The award of attorney fees shall not exceed $25,000.