The Maryland Supreme Court heard arguments on Monday regarding an appeal that could impact 1,300 lawsuits filed under the Child Victims Act. The 2023 law removed time barriers for individuals to file claims of institutional sex abuse. At issue is whether the General Assembly, when passing the law, clearly and knowingly waived the state’s immunity from lawsuits for claims occurring before 1982.
Jonathan Massey, attorney for a plaintiff known only as J.C., argued that the waiver of damage caps in the 2023 law demonstrates legislative intent to waive state sovereign immunity. Massey stated, “The change is the waiver of state sovereign immunity, and make changes that assume there will be a damages cap, assuming there will be liability to the state, right? That’s why you need a damages cap because there’s going to be liability to the state. I don’t think the legislature was silent in 2023 on the issue of sovereign immunity.”
The appeal involves a claim of sexual abuse from 1977, when J.C. was a patient at the old Prince George’s Hospital Center, where she alleged a doctor molested her during a stay. State lawyers argued that the state was protected by sovereign immunity at the time of the alleged abuse. Prior to 1982, the state could not face civil lawsuits, and the state’s lawyers asked a Prince George’s County judge to dismiss the case on those grounds.
Attorneys representing the state filed roughly 200 motions to dismiss cases involving claims before July 1, 1982. The state has argued that the legislature must expressly waive the 40-year-old immunity provision, something they said the 2023 law did not do. Judges at the Circuit Court level granted four motions at the time the appeal was filed with the state’s highest court. The Prince George’s County court denied the state’s motion without a hearing or explanation. But judges in Frederick County and Baltimore City have agreed with the state. Each dismissed cases under the sovereign immunity argument.
The Supreme Court’s ruling on the issue comes with a dollar sign attached. Cases involving allegations occurring before 1982 comprise about 11% of the 12,000 cases that have been filed under the Child Victims Act. The 2023 law capped damages against the state at $890,000 per occurrence, but the definition of an “occurrence” is still being debated. The full extent of the state’s potential liability has never been publicly stated. A rough estimate shows potentially budget-busting consequences.
If each plaintiff alleged just one occurrence and received the maximum award, the potential liability to the state could be about $11 billion. That estimate is nearly four times the structural budget gap projected for the fiscal 2028 budget to be introduced in January. The potential payout could go up if a court or jury defines “occurrence” as each instance of abuse, rather than bundling instances based on any number of related circumstances. Settlements could reduce the potential liability.
If lawyers for the state are successful in getting the pre-1982 cases blocked, it would reduce the state’s potential liability by “more than a billion dollars,” the Office of the Attorney General argued in a filing earlier this year.
During the nearly hour-long oral arguments Monday, justices seemed focused on whether the Child Victims Act waived sovereign immunity in an “unambiguous manner.” And if that was not the case, could legislative intent be used to rule that the General Assembly had in fact waived the immunity. “If their intent was to undo sovereign immunity, isn’t it a little odd that they didn’t mention it?”
