Court Opinion

ID: 9764964
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 03:46:29.503822+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:02.813849
License: Public Domain

SPAIN, Justice,
dissenting.
In addition to concurring with the dissenting opinion of Special Justice Taliaferro with regard to applying the doctrine of absolute immunity to the acts of County Attorney McCollum in this case, I also dissent from so much of the Majority’s opinion as holds that Mr. McCollum was properly sued in his individual capacity by Appellee Garrett.
*538In my opinion, the circuit judge correctly ruled that Garrett’s complaint was fatally defective for failing to assert a claim against him in his individual capacity. Since Garrett sued him only as Henderson County Attorney, he is entitled to the sovereign immunity of the county as pointed out by the Majority, citing Cullinan v. Jefferson County, Ky., 418 S.W.2d 407 (1967).
As the Majority opinion points out, McCol-lum is referred to in the caption of the complaint only as “Charles R. McCollum, III, Henderson County Attorney.” Furthermore, in paragraph two it is alleged that McCollum “... is and was at all relevant times Henderson County Attorney.” Finally, in the concluding demand of the complaint, Garrett merely states that she is seeking judgment “against the defendants” (referring to McCollum and Deputy Sheriff Larry Cottingham, whose official title was also included in the caption after his name). Nowhere in the body of the complaint does Garrett ever indicate in any way that McCol-lum and Cottingham were sued in their individual capacities.
In reversing the circuit court, the Court of Appeals held that the complaint was sufficient to state an individual claim against Mr. McCollum and cited in support of its holding the case of Nix v. Norman, 879 F.2d 429 (8th Cir.1989). It seems that this case contradicts rather than supports the holding of the Court of Appeals. In Nix, the caption of the complaint stated, “Laura Nix v. Bobby Norman, Arkansas Commission on Law Enforcement Standards and Training and the State of Arkansas.” The court commented with respect to the capacity in which the defendant was sued:
We have repeatedly stated that Section 1983 litigants wishing to sue government agents in both capacities should simply use the following language: “Plaintiff sues each and all defendants in both their individual and official capacities.”
Nix, 879 F.2d at 431 (citations omitted).
Nix held that the plaintiffs complaint did not properly state a cause of action against the defendant in his individual capacity, stating that:
Other than mentioning “joint and several liability” in her prayer for relief, Nix failed to indicate with the requisite clarity that she sought damages directly from Norman.
Id. at 431. Thus, Nix provides no support for the Court of Appeals decision that plaintiff stated a claim against McCollum in his individual capacity.
Our own Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals addressed a similar issue in Wells v. Brown, 891 F.2d 591 (1989), wherein it stated:
Although modern pleading is less rigid than in an earlier day, (see Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-56, 78 S.Ct. 99, 101-02, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957)), we have not let down all pleading barriers. It is not too much to ask that if a person or entity is to be subject to suit, the person or entity should be properly named and clearly notified of the potential for payment of damages individually.
Wells, 891 F.2d at 593 (citing Brandon v. Holt, 469 U.S. 464, 474, 105 S.Ct. 873, 879, 83 L.Ed.2d 878 (1985) (Burger, C.J., concurring in the judgment)). The Court also noted that “[i]t is certainly reasonable to ask that all plaintiffs, even pro se plaintiffs, some of whom file several appeals each year with us, alert party defendants that they may be individually responsible in damages. The trial and appellate courts should not have to guess at the nature of the claim asserted.” Wells, 891 F.2d at 594 (citing Clark v. National Travelers Life Ins. Co., 518 F.2d 1167 (6th Cir.1975)). As this Court recently stated, “there must be maintained some minimum standard in the art of pleading which must be met.” Morgan v. O’Neil, Ky., 652 S.W.2d 83 (1983).
More recently in Lovelace v. O’Hara, 985 F.2d 847 (1993), the Sixth Circuit once again wrestled with the distinction between suits against persons in individual and official capacities. There the plaintiff filed an action for damages under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against “Officer Lake [sic] O’Hara, Deputy Sheriff, Pendleton County Sheriff’s Department.” The district court, Judge Bertelsman, treated the complaint as being against O’Hara in his official capacity and granted summary judg*539ment to the sheriffs department. The district court also granted Lovelace’s motion to amend the complaint, naming O’Hara in his individual capacity, despite the running of the one-year statute of limitations. The district court ruled that “the language of the original complaint was broad enough to give O’Hara notice that he was being sued in his individual capacity.” The district court then granted O’Hara’s motion for summary judgment based on qualified immunity. Id. at 849. On appeal, the Sixth Circuit reversed and ordered the district court to enter an order dismissing the amended complaint on the grounds that it was barred by the statute of limitations. Id. at 852. The court stated:
Furthermore, the distinction between an official capacity and an individual capacity suit is significant. As the dissent in Hill v. Shelander noted, “an amendment in a defendant’s capacity in a lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. § 1988 alters the elements of recovery and defense ... [and] require[s] major changes in pleading, discovery, trial preparation and selection and location of witnesses to testify at trial.”
Lovelace, 985 F.2d at 850 (citing Hill v. Shelander, 924 F.2d 1370, 1384 (7th Cir.1991) (Coffey, J., dissenting)).
It seems to the writer that the Majority strains the doctrine of liberal construction of pleadings to the breaking point. Why should the Court of Appeals and this Court presume that the plaintiff intended to sue McCollum in his individual capacity when the drafter of the complaint had only to add the words “individually and as Henderson County Attorney” or simply “Charles R. McCollum, III, in his individual capacity”?
I would reverse the Court of Appeals and affirm the judgment of the trial court in its entirety.
STEPHENS, C.J., concurs in this dissent on the issue of individual capacity.