As
Citizens of Georgia, you may be surprised
to learn that, according to exceedingly broad court interpretations of the
Georgia Tort Claims Act (GTCA), you have no re-course against state officials
who sexually assault you, sexually harass you, slam your head into a door, or
even file your teeth down to nubs.
You
citizens of Georgia are also likely
unaware that state agencies and officials are immune from suit for gross
negligence that results in your rape or murder, under an exception to the GTCA
that immunizes state officials against assault and battery claims—under any and
all circumstances.
The
Georgia Attorney General, who defends the
State in these actions, and the courts, in their zealous expansion of the GTCA,
have even erased a provision of the Georgia Constitution that holds state
officials liable if they act with malicious intent to harm you. It does not
matter if the state official violates other laws or rules governing his conduct
on the job—even if the state official is committing criminal acts. In fact,
courts have held state inspectors immune for taking bribes to falsify
inspections, and state budget officials immune for stealing funds and cooking
the books to hide the theft. In each case, the Attorney General asserted
immunity and the courts agreed.
Sovereign
Immunity March 3, 2015
What
State Officials Can Get Away With In Georgia
Here
are twelve of the most egregious applications of sovereign immunity in order to
protect state officials from any accountability to you as a citizen. We expect
you will be shocked at the reprehensible and unacceptable con-duct state
officials can get away with in Georgia… while being defended by your Attorney
General.
1.
Davis v. Standifer, 621 S.E.2d 852, 275 Ga.App. 769 (Ga. App., 2005)
A Georgia woman filed suit
claiming a Georgia State Trooper put his hand up her dress against her will and
inserted his fingers into her vagina. The Georgia Court of Appeals held the
state trooper to be immune from the suit, even if the woman’s allegations were
true, because the molestation occurred during a traffic stop, and therefore was
committed in the course of the trooper performing his official duties.
2.
Ferrell v. Young, 746 S.E.2d 167, 323 Ga.App. 338 (Ga. App., 2013)
The court held a state police
officer immune for fondling the genitals of the arrest-ed suspect under the
assault and battery exception to the GTCA—because the officer was acting in the
scope of his state employment.
3.
Ridley v. Johns, 552 S.E.2d 853, 274 Ga. 241 (Ga., 2001)
In this case involving a state office
supervisor’s sexual harassment of a subordi-nate, a unanimous Georgia Supreme
Court held the state official immune under the GTCA for, again, performing his
official duties. “Since there is no exemption in the [GTCA] for acts motivated
by malice or an intent to injure, the presence of such motivation has no effect
on the immunity granted by the statute.”
Could
This Happen To You?
7.
Tootle v Cartee, 634 SE2d 90, 92, 280 Ga. App. 428, 429 (Ga. App. 2006)
Though Southeastern Technical
College rules bar public disclosure of the reason for dismissing an employee,
the case for violating that policy was dismissed on the grounds that even state
officials breaking state rules were acting in their offi-cial capacities. Thus
the court held that even illegal and unauthorized acts were immunized as
performance of official duties, and that that the GTCA immunized defamation
even if performed with actual malice and intent to cause injury
8.
Sommers Oil Co. v. Georgia Dep't of Agriculture, 305 Ga.App. 330, 699 S.E.2d
537 (Ga. App., 2010)
A Georgia Department of Agriculture (“DOA”)
inspector colluded with gas stations on I-95 to allow them to falsely calibrate
their pumps so that customers received less gas than they paid for. The DOA was
held to be immune for these criminal actions of its inspector, under the GTCA
exception for licensing and inspection functions. Thus a provision that is
supposed to allow the state to perform this function to the best of its
ability, free from liability, in reality authorized a conspira-cy by state
employees to intentionally subvert the state’s licensing and inspection
functions—and no citizen of Georgia harmed by the criminal conspiracy had any
recourse.
Immunity
for Assault & Battery,
Strangulation
and Rape
9.
Mattox v. Bailey, 472 S.E.2d 130, 131 221 Ga.App. 546 (Ga. App., 1996)
A prison inmate claimed a
corrections officer slammed his head into a door and then continued to beat him
while escorting him across the prison grounds. The court dismissed the claim
holding that, regardless of the extent of the injuries or the motive for the
beating, the officer was immune under the GTCA exception for battery. In fact,
by the logic of subsequent assault and battery exception cases citing this
precedent, the officer would be immune if he killed the inmate out of pure
premeditated malice.
10. Georgia
Military College v. Santamorena, 514 S.E.2d 82, 237 Ga.App. 58 (Ga. App., 1999)
The College was immune for
negligence despite the absence of any security pre-cautions in the housing for
its two female students at the time, because the rape of one of the two females
in her room by another student fell under the GTCA assault and battery
exception. According to the logic of the opinions, the State would be immune if
the College Dean raped the student.
11.
Department of Human Resources v. Hutchinson, 456 S.E.2d 642, 217 Ga.App. 70
(Ga. App., 1995)
The State was not liable for
negligence in placing a known violent juvenile in Hutchinson’s foster care,
after the juvenile in her foster care shot Hutchinson, because the shooting
fell under the GTCA assault and battery exception to waiver of sovereign
immunity.
12.
Department of Human Resources v. Coley, 544 S.E.2d 165, 247 Ga.App. 392 (Ga.
App., 2000)
A patient at Central State
Hospital was strangled to death after he was placed in a room with another
patient who had threatened to kill someone in order to get a transfer to a
different building for the criminally insane. The court found that the “loss”
was caused, not by the state’s negligence, but by the assault [by a third
party] for which state is immune. Quoting the Court of Appeals legal logic: It
can-not be disputed that, when a plaintiff is injured by an assault or battery,
his loss "results" from such assault or battery, even though there
may have been other contributing factors. And the statute clearly provides that
the state shall have no liability for the "loss."
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