An advance look at recent decisions that will appear as the "Most Important Opinions" in the next week's issue.
Retirement
ERISA - Erroneous estimates - Pension
Where a plaintiff brought suit under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, arguing that the defendant employer must pay him the amount of the erroneous benefit estimates he received before he left the defendant's employ instead of the lesser amount he was entitled to under the defendant's employee benefit plan, a judgment for the defendant must be affirmed because of the plaintiff's failure to show any fiduciary breach.
"... [Human resources representative Wayne] Brundige calculated an estimate of [plaintiff John W.] Livick's Gillette pension based on a hire date of 1976 instead of the appropriate Gillette hire date of 1996. That estimate put Livick's Gillette pension at $2832 a month. ...
"[A] new benefit statement correctly showed that Livick's Gillette pension would be based solely on the years he worked for Gillette. This dropped his Gillette pension down to $789 a month; his Parker Pen [Co.] pension ($1047 a month) presumably remained unchanged. ...
"As Livick acknowledges, Brundige (the human resources representative) is not a named fiduciary under the Plan. Brundige was also not a functional fiduciary because providing Livick with an estimate of his future pension benefits was not a fiduciary task. ...
"Providing estimates of benefits is not a fiduciary function, nor is hiring someone to provide such estimates purely for plan members' use. With no fiduciary function involved, there can be no breach of fiduciary duty. ...
"The pension Livick is receiving accounts for all his years of service at Parker Pen and Gillette. It is the amount provided for under the clear terms of the Plan. Livick understood (or should have understood) these clear terms due to multiple personal letters he received from the company and from his own research on the company website. Nothing in ERISA secures to him a windfall when a ministerial employee makes a mistake in an estimate, a mistake of which the beneficiary is or should be aware because of the company's clear and accurate ERISA disclosures."
Livick v. The Gillette Co., et al. (Lawyers Weekly No. 01-125-08) (17 pages) (Lynch, J.) (1st Circuit) Appealed from a decision by Tauro, J., in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Thomas G. Moukawsher, with whom Moukawsher & Walsh was on brief, for the plaintiff-appellant; Richard P. Ward, with whom M. Concetta Burton and Ropes & Gray were on brief, for the defendants-appellees (Docket No. 07-2108) (April 17, 2008).
* * *
Negligence
Medical malpractice - EMTALA
Where a plaintiff brought suit against the defendant hospital pursuant to the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act, alleging that the hospital's director violated the Act by informing paramedics, who were transporting the plaintiff in an ambulance, that the hospital would not admit the plaintiff because of uncertainty over her insurance status, the complaint should not have been dismissed, as the allegations came within the scope of the Act.
"This appeal requires us to determine for the first time what it means to 'come[] to' a hospital's emergency department within the purview of the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA), 42 U.S.C. §1395dd. After carefully considering the language of EMTALA, the regulation addressing the pertinent statutory text, and the policies that underlie the statute, we hold that an individual can come to the emergency department for EMTALA purposes without physically arriving on the hospital's grounds as long as the individual is en route to the hospital and the emergency department has been notified of her imminent arrival. We therefore reverse the order terminating the action and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. ...
"While in transit to the [defendant] Hospital [Español Auxilio Mutuo de Puerto Rico], the paramedics called ahead to the emergency department and notified the director, Dr. Salvador Marquez, of the plaintiff's condition, forthcoming arrival, and need for treatment. In the first of two conversations with the paramedics, Dr. Marquez seemed worried that the plaintiff might voluntarily have induced an abortion. He also stated that he was very busy and asked the paramedics to call back when they had more information about the suspected abortion.
"When the paramedics telephoned again, Dr. Marquez inquired as to whether the plaintiff had medical coverage or was a member of the Hospital's insurance program. Receiving no such assurances, he abruptly terminated the call (an action that the paramedics interpreted as a refusal to treat the plaintiff at the Hospital's emergency department). ...
"... Presented with an imprecise statute, an unenlightening regulation, and an absence of any clear agency interpretation of what that regulation means, we must rely on the manifest purpose of the statute to interpret the critical statutory phrase. On that basis, and taking the facts and the reasonable inferences therefrom in the light most hospitable to the plaintiff, we hold that a reasonable factfinder could conclude that the plaintiff had come to the Hospital's emergency department within the purview of EMTALA; that a request for examination or treatment had been tendered on her behalf; and that the request had been rebuffed because of her uninsured status. Consequently, the case is not an appropriate candidate for summary judgment."
Morales, et al. v. Sociedad Española de Auxilio Mutuo y Beneficencia, et al. (Lawyers Weekly No. 01-127-08) (24 pages) (Selya, Sr. Cir. J.) (1st Circuit) Appealed from the U.S. District Court for the District of Puerto Rico (Docket No. 07-1951) (April 18, 2008).
* * *
Criminal
Probation revocation
Where a defendant has appealed a revocation of his probation, we hold that his appeal must be rejected because evidence indicates he did violate certain "no contact" probationary orders while serving a prison term.
"Two probationary conditions in the order of the sentencing judge directed that the defendant was to have no contact with the victim, his former domestic partner. However, it is argued in this appeal that, because the three-year probation period was to flow from and after the defendant's five and one-half year term of imprisonment for his rape of the victim, revocation of probation because of a violation of the no contact probationary orders could not be predicated upon the defendant's acts while he was serving his prison term precedent to the ensuing probationary term. In essence, the argument advanced by the defendant is that because the probationary conditions would not be activated until his release from prison, they were not of force and effect during his prison incarceration, and therefore could not be the legal basis for the revocation of probation.
"We determine that the no contact conditions of probation, as set in the orders of the sentencing judge at disposition and signed by the defendant in the probation contract, were legally enforceable and structured in a manner to be binding and to impose active probationary restrictions on the defendant both during the term of imprisonment and during the from and after continuing probation following the defendant's release from prison. Accordingly, for the reasons stated herein, we affirm the order revoking the defendant's probation, and imposing a sentence of one year to one year and one day from and after the sentence imposed on the rape conviction."
Subscribers Only
