Metropolitan News-Enterprise

 

Monday, May 24, 2021

 

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Court of Appeal:

LAUSD Not Subject to Treble Damages Law

Opinion Says Such Damages Are Punitive, Can’t Be Applied to Public Entity  

 

By a MetNews Staff Writer

 

The Los Angeles Unified School District cannot be held liable under a statute providing for the prospect of treble damages because it is punitive in nature, thus exempting a public entity from its reach, Div. Three of the Court of Appeal for this district held Friday.

Plaintiff Jane Doe contends she was sexually assaulted at age 14 by Daniel Garcia, an employee at Daniel Pearl Magnet High School in the San Fernando Valley, and that this would not have occurred had the school district not covered up a previous assault on a student by Garcia. In seeking punitive damages, she invoked Code of Civil Procedure §340.1(b)(1).

That section provides that a victim of a childhood assault who “proves it was as the result of a cover up may recover up to treble damages against a defendant who is found to have covered up the sexual assault of a minor, unless prohibited by another law.”

The school district moved for an order striking the treble-damages claim, pointing to Government Code §818 which exempts a public entity from a damage award “imposed primarily for the sake of example and by way of punishing the defendant.”

Noting that the statute “makes no reference to punitive damages,” Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Shirley K. Watkins on Aug. 12, 2020 ,denied the motion. She reasoned:

“Nothing in the legislative history provided by Defendant shows any intent to interpret treble damages as punishment. Because the treble damages herein are not for punishment but for compensation, the immunity under GC §818 is inapplicable.”

Writ Granted

Div. Three granted a petition for a writ of mandate, sought by the district. Justice Anne H. Egerton wrote:

“Plaintiff does not identify any injury from a childhood sexual assault or cover up for which normal tort damages fail to provide full compensation. Nor does the legislative history she presents. And we are unable to discern any uncompensated injury or unfulfilled right to compensation ourselves….On the contrary, the treble damages imposed under section 340.1 are, by definition, in addition to a plaintiffs actual damages, and the statute necessarily awards the plaintiff, upon proof of a cover up, damages ‘beyond the equivalent of harm done.’ ”

She continued:

Because the treble damages provision under section 340.1 plainly is designed to punish those who cover up childhood sexual abuse and thereby to deter future cover ups, rather than to compensate victims, the imposition of these damages is primarily punitive under section 818.”

Legislator’s Comment

The bill creating §340.1 was authored by Assembly member Lorena Gonzalez, D-San Diego. The Assembly floor analysis quoted her as saying:

“This reform is clearly needed both to compensate victims who never should have been victims—and would not have been if past sexual assault had been properly brought to light—and also as an effective deterrent against individuals and entities who have chosen to protect the perpetrators of sexual assault over the victims.” While Doe seized on that language, Egerton discounted it, saying:

“A solitary statement repeated in some legislative analyses that treble damages are necessary to compensate victims of a cover up does not unambiguously demonstrate the Legislature in fact added the provision to section 340.1 for that purpose. Critically, the statement does not identify what injury these treble damages are needed to compensate….Moreover, the moral condemnation voiced in the statement…while plainly warranted, indicates the bill’s author may have had a primarily punitive motivation for imposing treble damages in response to patently heinous conduct. Whether this was indeed the author’s motivation is beside the point. The fact that this solitary statement is open to such inferences is enough for us to decline to embrace it as an unambiguous expression of the Legislature’s intent.”

Doe argued that public policy would be furthered by allowing treble damages. Egerton responded:

“Even if we agreed with plaintiff that the treble damages provision might incentivize victims to file claims for childhood sexual assault, this supposed public policy objective does not remove the enhanced damages provision from section 818’s purview.”

The case is Doe v. Los Angeles Unified School District, B307389.

Calvin House and Arthur C. Preciado of the Pasadena firm of Gutierrez, Preciado & House, represented the school district.  David M. Ring and Natalie L. Weatherford of the Manhattan Beach firm of Taylor & Ring and Holly N. Boyer of the Pasadena firm of Esner, Chang & Boyer were attorneys on appeal for Doe.

 

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