Court Opinion

ID: 9718144
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:17:43.658907+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:57.564440
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE GREIMAN, dissenting: I respectfully dissent from the majority. “In giving effect to the statutory intent, the court should consider, in addition to the statutory language, the reason for the law, the problems to be remedied, and the objects and purposes sought.” General Motors Corp. v. State of Illinois Motor Vehicle Review Board, 224 Ill. 2d 1, 13 (2007). Moreover, when interpreting a statute, we must presume that the legislature did not intend to produce absurd, inconvenient or unjust consequences as a result of the law. Brucker v. Mercola, 227 Ill. 2d 502, 514 (2007). I conclude that the language of the statute dictates that a handling fee of $20 or below is per se reasonable.4 The intent of the legislature is clear in that it wanted to expressly define the allowable charges for copies requested by presumably thousands of patients a year. My construction is supported by the “reason for the law, the problems to be remedied, and the objects and purposes sought” (General Motors Corp., 224 Ill. 2d at 13), which is apparent from the House and Senate transcripts discussing the statutory amendment. In particular, Senator Cullerton introduced the amended bill as follows: “This bill, which was amended today, reflects a compromise, the issue being how much money patients and clients of professionals can be charged to get their own records back. And as a result of our negotiations ***, we were able to get the Trial Lawyers, the Medical Society, the Hospital Association and the representatives of the companies that do copy records to agree to this procedure, which applies not only, as I said, to hospital records, but also attorneys’ records. And it basically sets up a sliding scale of copying charges and an initial fee that you have to pay, a handling charge of [$20], And as I said, everybody has agreed to it.” 92d Ill. Gen. Assem., Senate Proceedings, April 5, 2001, at 226-27 (statements of Senator Cullerton). Representative Turner further stated: “The genesis of this Bill actually was not from the Trial Lawyers Association nor was it from the ISBA. It came from what I saw going on in my law practice where I would, from time to time on behalf of clients, request medical records. On several occasions I would get one page for $30, or two pages for $35, or perhaps three or four pages for $50. It became *** abundantly clear that we needed to try to address this situation through legislation that would put some cap on what the charges would be for medical records. We included attorneys in that so that attorney records going to clients would have a cap. And the purpose of this is not to assist lawyers, it’s not to assist doctors. It’s simply to assist patients and clients so that they can get copies of their own records at a reasonable cost. This is a Bill that has been compromised. I think it does address, in part, the concerns that caused me to raise the issue in the first place.” 92d Ill. Gen. Assem., House Proceedings, May 8, 2001, at 47-48 (statements of Representative Turner). Representative Turner confirmed that the intent of the $20 handling fee was to serve as an “order fee” or a “deposit fee” at the time the records were requested. 92d Ill. Gen. Assem., House Proceedings, May 8, 2001, at 46. Accordingly, the legislature intended the $20 handling fee to be a one-time charge for obtaining records that was a per se reasonable method to avoid excessive and variable fees. I recognize the majority’s argument that, because its language is unambiguous, we are restricted to the plain language of the statute; however, the goal of statutory interpretation is to ascertain the intent of the legislature, which, in this case, includes more than an application of the dictionary definitions of the statutory terms. Furthermore, simply stated, requiring a court to determine a reasonable handling charge whenever an individual requests copies of his or her records is absurd, inconvenient and unjust.5  Moreover, a reviewing court must presume the legislature was aware of prior legislation and crafted our statute with that knowledge. See State v. Mikusch, 138 Ill. 2d 242, 247-48 (1990) (“[i]t is presumed that the legislature, in enacting various statutes, acts rationally and with full knowledge of all previous enactments”). Prior to the amendment at issue, the statute was silent on the issue of copying fees; however, in Clay v. Little Company of Mary Hospital, 277 Ill. App. 3d 175, 180 (1995), the court interpreted the statute to imply a reasonableness standard. Further, at the time the statute was crafted, nearly every state had a statute related to the cost of obtaining medical records, which fell into one of four main categories: (1) those that required reasonable fees or actual costs; (2) those that specified preset or maximum fees; (3) those that remained silent on reproduction costs; and (4) those that imposed no costs. E Stearns, Access to and Cost of Reproduction of Patient Medical Records: A Comparison of State Laws, 21 J. Legal Med. 79, 80-81 (2000). Tellingly, our legislature chose to explicitly define what was reasonable by providing a maximum fee. I find further support for my construction in out-of-state cases interpreting similar statutes.6 In In re Metro ROI, Inc., 203 S.W3d 400 (Tex. App. 2006), a Texas court interpreted the fee announced in its statute as presumptively reasonable. In re Metro ROI, Inc., 203 S.W.3d at 406. The Texas statute provided that “the hospital may charge a reasonable fee” for copying health care information; however, the “fee may not exceed the sum of” a retrieval fee, including the first 10 copied pages, which “may not exceed $30,” per page fees thereafter and the actual cost of mailing. In re Metro ROI, Inc., 203 S.W3d at 404, citing Tex. Health & Safety Code Ann. §241.154(b) (2001). The Texas court reasoned that, “[b]y specifying the maximum fees which can be charged, the Legislature *** clearly indicated what constitute[d] an unreasonable fee.” In re Metro ROI, Inc., 203 S.W.3d at 406. Moreover, in In re Casillo, 150 Misc. 2d 420, 580 N.Y.S.2d 992 (1992), a New York court analyzed the legislative intent of an amended statute commanding that “the reasonable charge for paper copies shall not exceed [75] cents per page” and concluded that: “it was enacted to create a unifying definition for the ‘reasonable charge’ standard and to stem the burgeoning costs being imposed on patients seeking to obtain their own medical records for whatever purpose.” Casillo, 151 Misc. 2d at 429, 580 N.Y.S.2d at 998. See N.Y. Pub. Health Law §17 (McKinney 2002). As the comments by Senator Cullerton and Representative Turner demonstrate, the instant statutes were enacted to achieve the same result; therefore, contrary to the majority’s decision, I believe a similar construction should be applied. Also persuasive is Pratt v. Smart Corp., 968 S.W.2d 868 (Tenn. App. 1997), where a Tennessee court determined that, although the statute did not establish a definite maximum copy charge, parties could not define “reasonable cost” in an excessive manner because doing so would inherently violate the provisions of and the policy behind the statute. Pratt, 968 S.W2d at 870, citing Tenn. Code. Ann. §68— 11 — 304(a)(2)(A) (West 1998). The Pratt court’s construction was later proven accurate when the Tennessee legislature amended the statute in 2007, providing that per-page flat fees and a certification fee “not to exceed” $20 were presumed reasonable. See Tenn. Code Ann. §68— 11 — 304(a)(2)(A)(iii)(a) (West Supp. 2008). Furthermore, both the Massachusetts and New Hampshire legislatures amended their statutes from former generalized versions of requisite “reasonable costs” to providing a specified, “not to exceed” amount (see Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 111, §70 (amended in 2004); N.H. Rev. Stat. §151:21(X) (amended in 2001)), demonstrating the need to explicitly define what is reasonable and not reserve that determination to a case-by-case basis. Accordingly, combining the language of our statute, “reason for the law, the problems to be remedied, and the objects and purposes sought” (General Motors Corp., 224 Ill. 2d at 13) and the interpretive guidance from similarly worded out-of-state statutes, I conclude that the $20 handling fee is per se reasonable. Any other interpretation would force every provider to undergo an assessment of the appropriate charge for each individual request, inevitably resulting in a lack of uniform charges and natural inequities. Such a result is absurd, unjust and inconvenient and not in line with the legislature’s intent, especially when the language was expressly agreed upon by all parties involved.7  Accordingly, I would answer the certified question in the affirmative.  In dicta, the Third District noted that the specified handling charge was reasonable. Ramirez v. Smart Corp., 371 Ill. App. 3d 797, 804 n.l (2007).   We note that both in their brief and at oral argument plaintiffs’ argue that looking beyond the plain language of the statute in order to avoid absurd, inconvenient and unjust results is a high standard; however, plaintiffs fail to cite any authority for that proposition.   Although there are numerous statutes which mimic the statute at issue, our research has revealed only two cases on point. See, e.g., Ala. Code §12— 21 — 6.1 (1995); Cal. Health & Safety Code §123110 (Bearing 1997); Mass. Ann. Laws ch. 112, §12CC (LexisNexis 2004); Mass. Ann. Laws ch. 111, §70 (LexisNexis 2004); Me. Rev. Stat. Ann. tit. 22, §1711 — A (2004); Mont. Code Ann. §50 — 16—816 (2007); Tenn. Code Ann. §68 — 11—304 (2006); Tex. Health & Safety Code Ann. §241.154 (2001); W Va. Code Ann. §16 — 29—2 (LexisNexis 2006) (statutes with forms of “reasonable” ... “but not to exceed” language); Ga. Code Ann. §31 — 33—3 (2006); In. Code §16 — 39—9—2 (2007 Supp.); N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. §151:21 (LexisNexis 2005); Kan. Stat. Ann. §65— 4971 (2002); Md. Code Ann., Health-Gen. §4 — 304 (LexisNexis 2005); Mo. Ann. Stat. §191.227 (West 2004); N.B. Cent. Code § 23 — 12—14 (2002); Neb. Rev. St. Ann. §71 — 8404 (LexisNexis 2008); Ohio Rev. Code Ann. §3701.741 (LexisNexis 2005); Okla. Stat. Ann. tit. 76, §19 (West 2002); S.C. Code Ann. §44 — 115—80 (2002) (statutes with “not to exceed” language).   It belies logic that the record copying companies and health care providers would agree, as indicated by Senator Cullerton, with a statute that potentially exposed them to a case-by-case inquiry as to the reasonableness of the handling fee. See 92d Ill. Gen. Assem., Senate Proceedings, April 5, 2001, at 226-27 (statements of Senator Cullerton).