The Connecticut Supreme Court ruled that a decision by the Connecticut Claims Commissioner and approval by the General Assembly allowing an individual to sue the state waives sovereign immunity but does not affect judicial immunity, according to a decision reached in a lawsuit filed by a parent against the Department of Children and Families over the 2012 death of a toddler.
In order to file a lawsuit against the State of Connecticut, one must first seek permission from the Office of the Claims Commissioner (OCC), a lengthy process in which the commissioner or an appointed deputy commissioner evaluates the case and makes a recommendation to the Judiciary Committee on whether the lawsuit should be allowed to proceed in court. The Judiciary Committee votes to approve or disapprove, and it is then forwarded to the General Assembly for a vote.
In allowing a lawsuit against the state to be filed in court, the General Assembly is essentially waiving the state’s sovereign immunity so that it can be sued like any other individual. However, that does not waive judicial immunity, which extends to state employees acting on behalf of the court, according to the Supreme Court ruling.
“A decision by the claims commissioner to authorize suit against the state waives the state’s sovereign immunity from suit, as well as any related defenses that derive from the state’s sovereign status,” the Supreme Court wrote. “The statute does not waive common-law defenses, such as quasi-judicial immunity, that are not inherently governmental and that could be raised in like circumstances by a private party.”
The case involves the death of toddler Toni G., who had special needs and was placed in temporary custody of relatives by the Probate Court in 2011. Toni G’s mother was homeless and had little ability to care for the child, and her father – the plaintiff in this case – was incarcerated at the time. The family members with whom Toni was placed, however, also had a history of neglect and abuse, although those substantiated allegations were a decade old, according to the decision.
As the child’s custody status was in limbo, the Probate Court ordered DCF to conduct an evaluation and make a custody recommendation to the court. DCF completed the report, recommending the child continue to stay in her current placement. However, before the court could hold a hearing, the child wandered away from the house and drowned in a nearby pond.
The father sought to file suit against DCF in 2013 and was initially denied by the claims commissioner in 2016. The General Assembly, however, vacated the claims commissioner’s decision and remanded it for a hearing on the merits in 2017. In 2022, the claims commissioner recommended that the lawsuit be allowed to move forward.
The father alleged DCF negligence in advising that Toni’s “maternal relatives’ home was a suitable placement,” and alleges that placement was the “proximate cause of her death.” The plaintiff further alleges that DCF workers ignored his claim that he’d found Toni wandering away from the home when he came to visit one day, a claim the social worker denied.
However, the trial court – and the Supreme Court affirmed – that DCF workers were afforded judicial and quasi-judicial immunity in carrying out the orders of the Probate Court in conducting their evaluation and making their recommendation, and that immunity was not waived by the claims commissioner nor the General Assembly.
However, it doesn’t necessarily mean that DCF is off the hook completely. The Supreme Court agreed with the plaintiff that some of DCF’s actions “may not have been undertaken by DCF as an arm of the Probate Court and may have involved the performance of legal duties independent of those carried out at the direction of the court.”
While the DCF workers were assigned by the court to perform an evaluation, the plaintiff contends that there was “negligence” outside of those orders, particularly his allegation that the child was found 200 yards away from home in a neighbor’s yard two weeks before her death, and that the family had been unaware of her absence. The father claims he called the social worker to make a report, but the case worker testified that he never called her.
The Supreme Court determined that DCF workers and social workers are “as a general matter” protected under quasi-judicial immunity and agreed with the trial court that to remove that immunity would make them a “litigation lightning rod,” and hamper the department’s mission to protect children.
At the same time, however, the court affirmed that every social worker has “certain independent obligations,” such as acting when there is suspected child abuse or neglect, and DCF acknowledged that a failure to act in such a case “would not be shielded by absolute judicial immunity.”
The court determined that in this case it was too difficult to separate DCF’s actions under the orders of the Probate Court and those that would fall under DCF’s independent duties, thus reversing the trial court’s decision “as to any allegations in the complaint that are not subject to quasi-judicial immunity as a matter of law,” and sending it back to the trial court to make those determinations.
As evidenced by the plaintiff’s long timeline in finally bringing his claim to court, the OCC has long been plagued with a backlog of cases, as hundreds of Connecticut residents file claims annually the claims commissioner alone had to evaluate each of them until 2021, when the legislature passed House Bill 6506 requiring Gov. Ned Lamont to appoint six deputy commissioners to reduce the backlog and wait time which, in some instances, was upwards of five years.
That same bill is referenced in the Supreme Court decision for the clarifications it offered regarding immunities in response to testimony submitted by Attorney General William Tong, saying that, “prior to the passage of the 2021 amendments, the state could raise a defense of quasi-judicial immunity even after the claims commissioner had authorized suit against the state and that the state retained that right following passage of the 2021 amendments.”
“If a legal action could proceed against a private party, it ought not be barred simply because the defendant happens to be the state,” the Supreme Court wrote. “But we can discern no legislative intent also to waive specific immunities that are essential to carrying out key public duties, including those under-taken as part of the judicial process, even when the immunities could be raised by a private defendant and are not included within the scope of sovereign immunity”
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The supremacy clause of the USA constitution, coupled with the bill of rights, nullifies any protections, Connecticut state workers have created.
No one is above the United States constitution. This is one of many dumb laws, that are automatically eliminated, under the supremacy clause.
Everyone has to right to court, and a jury, if requested. The structure of Connecticut state workers needs to be reorganized, to reflect citizens and their needs.