Denise Clayton

The case involved a wrongful death claim by the estate of a public housing resident shot and killed by a third party, alleging negligence by the Housing Authority of Paducah and the City of Paducah in failing to provide adequate security. The trial court dismissed the claims based on KRS 411.155, which bars liability for injuries from criminal firearm use absent conspiracy or aiding by the defendant, and on sovereign immunity grounds for the city. The appellate court ruled that KRS 411.155 violates §§ 14 and 54 of the Kentucky Constitution by abolishing remedies for personal injuries, and that common law permits landlord liability for foreseeable criminal acts if reasonable steps were not taken to prevent them. The court remanded the claim against the housing authority for further proceedings but affirmed dismissal of the city, finding no special duty owed and that the housing authority was a separate entity.

criminal lawtorts & liability

This case involved a personal injury claim by Halderman against Sanderson Forklifts, an English company, after he was injured by a defective Winget dumper in Kentucky; the dumper had been sold through an Ohio distributor. The trial court dismissed the complaint on grounds that the one-year statute of limitations had run, the court lacked personal jurisdiction over the foreign defendant, and the breach-of-warranty claim failed for lack of privity. The appellate court held that the action was timely commenced under Kentucky Rules of Civil Procedure when the complaint was filed and summons issued in good faith, but affirmed dismissal because Sanderson Forklifts lacked sufficient minimum contacts with Kentucky to support personal jurisdiction and because KRS 355.2-318 warranty claims require privity limited to purchasers or household members. The court reasoned that the defendant's sale of three units to an Ohio distributor, with one ending up in Kentucky by chance, did not constitute purposeful availment of the forum state.

proceduretorts & liability

The case involved TARC, a self-insured employer, suing the tort-feasors in a 1986 motor vehicle accident to recover workers' compensation benefits it had paid to its injured bus driver employee; the suit was filed in November 1988. The Jefferson Circuit Court granted summary judgment for TARC, but the Court of Appeals reversed, holding the action time-barred. The court reasoned that TARC's subrogation claim under KRS 342.700(1) was derivative of the employee's tort claim rather than an independent statutory action, so it was subject to the two-year limitations period in KRS 304.39-230(6) of the Motor Vehicle Reparations Act instead of the five-year period in KRS 413.120(2).

labor & employmenttorts & liabilityprocedure

This case involved an appeal by Paul and Roxanne Elwell from a jury verdict finding them jointly and severally liable for converting the assets of Mary McKenney, a 90-year-old woman determined to lack mental capacity, through fraud and undue influence after she moved into their home; the verdict awarded compensatory damages for lost real estate value, cash, interest, and medical payments plus $10,000 in punitive damages. The Kentucky Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment in favor of McKenney's guardian, Sharon Stone. The court reasoned that the Elwells failed to comply with appellate briefing rules requiring identification of preserved errors and that the record contained ample evidence of exploitation beyond a scintilla, with no manifest injustice from declining to review unpreserved issues.

torts & liabilitypropertyprocedure

In Spears v. Spears, the husband appealed the denial of his CR 60.02 motion to reopen a 1985 divorce judgment that had presumed his paternity of a child born during the marriage and ordered him to pay child support. The wife had asserted the child's paternity after the husband petitioned for dissolution, leading the trial court to apply the presumption of legitimacy without further contest at the time. Years later, blood testing confirmed the husband was not the biological father, prompting his motion to set aside the paternity finding. The court held that res judicata would normally bar relitigation of the issue but that the doctrine must yield to fairness and justice when overwhelming evidence shows the man is not the father and no prior support demands had been made. It reversed and remanded for further proceedings on the motion.

family lawprocedure

The case involved Carol Floyd suing Humana hospitals, University of Louisville entities, and Dr. Lucas for permanent injuries allegedly caused by anesthesia during her Caesarean section delivery. The trial court granted summary judgments to the defendants, finding no negligence by Dr. Lucas, no actual or apparent agency relationships with the hospitals for the doctors involved, and no independent negligence claims. It also denied Floyd's motion to amend her complaint to add new allegations due to undue delay after she learned of other potential doctors involved. The Court of Appeals affirmed these rulings, emphasizing that vicarious liability claims fail without underlying negligence and that the admission forms disclosed independent contractor status of physicians.

torts & liabilityhealthcareprocedure

This case involves the involuntary hospitalization of Schuttemeyer following his acquittal by reason of insanity on a charge of first-degree wanton endangerment in Kenton Circuit Court. After the verdict, the circuit court held hearings and ordered his commitment to Eastern State Hospital for up to 360 days under KRS 504.030 and KRS Chapter 202A. On appeal, Schuttemeyer challenged the circuit court's jurisdiction, the sufficiency of the evidence, and multiple procedural failures in the commitment process. The court held that jurisdiction properly lay in the circuit court as the trial court referenced in the statutes, but found that the proceedings violated statutory requirements including the filing of a proper petition, examinations by two qualified professionals based on current evaluations, timely hearings, and adequate notice, which implicated due process protections. The judgment was remanded for further proceedings consistent with the required procedures under KRS Chapter 202A.

criminal lawprocedurecivil rights

This case involved the demotion of an elementary school principal by a local board of education, which the principal appealed on grounds that Kentucky statutes providing fewer protections for administrators than for tenured teachers violated equal protection, that she had a property interest entitling her to due process notice of prohibited conduct, and that the demotion infringed her First Amendment and state religious liberty rights because it was motivated by her religious expressions in memos to staff. The court held that school administrators are not a suspect class and public administrative employment is not a fundamental right, so rational basis review applies and the differing duties of administrators provide a sufficient justification for less job protection. It further held that administrators lack a property interest in their positions under the statutory scheme, precluding a due process claim. On the religious liberty claim, the court found the principal's expressions constituted protected conduct that factored into the demotion decision and remanded for a determination of whether she would have been demoted absent that conduct.

civil rightslabor & employmentfree speechreligious liberty

The case involved the conviction of Ron Howard for trafficking in marijuana under Kentucky law, based on a 1987 federal wiretap recording of a conversation in which he offered to sell a pound of the substance to the manager of a billiards hall under surveillance. Howard challenged the admission of the tape, arguing it was obtained illegally, that voice identification testimony was improper, that the Commonwealth failed to produce a physical sample of the marijuana, and that the evidence was insufficient to support a guilty verdict. The court affirmed the conviction, holding that the wiretap evidence was admissible absent collusion between state and federal authorities, that lay voice identification was proper under evidence rules, and that circumstantial evidence including the recorded offer and surrounding observations was sufficient for a jury to find guilt beyond a reasonable doubt even without a physical sample. The court also found no error in the trial court's handling of audibility or jury instructions during the penalty phase.

criminal lawprocedure

This case involved a dispute between cotenants Adrian Stacy and Cyprus Southern Realty (predecessor to MCI Mining) over the use of jointly owned surface land in Perry County, Kentucky, where the mineral estate had been severed and leased to Cyprus. Stacy sued for damages from strip mining on the property and for transporting foreign coal across it, seeking per-ton royalties. The trial court found Cyprus liable due to its cotenant status and awarded damages based on standard surface royalties and wheelage rates. On appeal, the court reversed, ruling that the severed mineral estate created no duty to account for mining and that the original mineral deed authorized haul roads for foreign coal transport. The case was remanded for further proceedings on damages consistent with these holdings.

propertytorts & liability

In Baker v. Perkins, grandmother Rose Helen Baker sued in circuit court for visitation rights with her granddaughter under KRS 405.021 after the child's father disappeared and the mother, Connie Perkins, obtained sole custody. The trial court denied visitation, reasoning that it would create conflict in the home and interfere with the mother's parental authority. On appeal, the court reversed and remanded, holding that the trial court had improperly substituted the custodial parent's opposition for the statutory best-interest standard. The appellate court directed the trial court to consider additional factors such as the child's relationship with the grandmother, the child's preferences, and the parties' health before ruling.

family law

The case involved a challenge to the validity of Andrew J. Fischer's will by his surviving relatives, Donald and Frederick Fischer, who claimed the testator lacked mental capacity due to a recent heart attack and stroke and was subject to undue influence by the beneficiaries. The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of the executors and beneficiaries, finding no genuine issues of fact regarding capacity or influence. The Court of Appeals reversed, holding that expert testimony and other evidence raised material factual questions about the testator's capacity and the beneficiaries' influence that precluded summary judgment and required a trial.

family lawprocedure

In this divorce proceeding, Mrs. Whittington sued Mr. Whittington for the tort of outrageous conduct causing severe emotional distress, alleging financial misconduct such as forging checks, hiding assets, refusing court-ordered support, and making threats to leave the country unless she agreed to his settlement terms. The Daviess Circuit Court dismissed the complaint for failure to state a cause of action, finding that the conduct did not qualify as outrageous. On appeal, the court affirmed the dismissal, holding that the alleged actions, even if true, amounted to ordinary fraud and adultery typical in divorce cases rather than the extreme conduct needed for tort liability under Kentucky precedent and Restatement (Second) of Torts § 46. The court concluded that suitable remedies were available through domestic relations laws instead.

family lawtorts & liability

The case involved a bank's repossession of a speedboat securing a defaulted loan from debtor Charles Henderson. After the bank arranged for a uniformed deputy sheriff to be present at the scene, its employees entered Henderson's open garage, hitched the boat, and removed it despite his verbal objections and a confrontation that was only defused by the deputy's arrival; Henderson sued for conversion, emotional distress, and punitive damages while the bank counterclaimed on the note. The trial court directed a verdict for Henderson on conversion of the boat and for the bank on its counterclaim, after which the jury awarded damages including punitives; post-trial motions resulted in the emotional-distress award being set aside. On appeal, the Court of Appeals affirmed the conversion judgment, holding that the repossession breached the peace under KRS 355.9-503 because it occurred over the debtor's objection with law-enforcement assistance present, while reversing only the emotional-distress portion.

business & regulatorypropertytorts & liability

This case involved a dispute over the duration of child support payments under an Indiana divorce decree after all parties had relocated to Kentucky. The mother petitioned to enforce support until the child reached age twenty-one per Indiana law, along with arrearages, increased payments, and attorney fees, while the father contended that Kentucky law should apply to terminate support at age eighteen. The court decided that Kentucky law controls the termination date in enforcement actions brought in the state, ordering support to end on the child's eighteenth birthday because the decree was silent and the age of majority in Kentucky is eighteen. The award of attorney fees and costs to the mother was affirmed as a proper exercise of the trial court's discretion.

family law

This case concerns a 1984 paternity action in which the mother sought to establish that the appellant was the father of a child born in 1971 and to recover child support arrearages back to the birth date. The father admitted paternity and agreed to prospective support but contested the retroactive award, asserting the defense of laches due to the fifteen-year delay in filing. The trial court awarded over $21,000 in arrearages from the birth date, and the circuit court affirmed on the ground that laches had not been properly pleaded. The appellate court reversed, holding that laches was adequately raised and constitutes a valid defense to pre-action arrearages in paternity cases; it relied on the legislative policy reflected in the subsequently enacted KRS 406.031, which limits liability for past support when actions are delayed, and remanded for calculation of support only from the date the action was commenced.

family lawprocedure

In Foley v. Production Credit Ass'n, plaintiff James Foley sued Nolin PCA after trading his truck for a stolen Bobcat loader and losing the truck when the other party pledged it as loan collateral that was later repossessed and sold. The trial court applied the Uniform Commercial Code rather than common-law conversion rules, granted summary judgment on punitive damages, directed a verdict for the PCA officer, and the jury found for the PCA. The appellate court affirmed, holding that the UCC's voidable-title doctrine (KRS 355.2-403) protected the PCA as a good-faith secured party because Foley had given the borrower apparent ownership, allowing transfer of good title to a bona-fide purchaser. The court rejected arguments that the PCA should have investigated further based on the borrower's bad check or corporate-title issues, noting that Foley himself had not retained a security interest and that the loss must fall on the party who enabled the fraud.

business & regulatorypropertytorts & liability

This case concerned a breach of contract claim by Capital Holding Corp. against Octagon Development Co. after Octagon obtained alternative financing instead of closing on a $2 million loan commitment for a medical office building project, for which it had paid a $60,000 standby fee. The trial court found the parties had entered a bilateral contract, held Octagon liable for breach, but ultimately dismissed Capital's suit for lost profits on the grounds that the fee was liquidated damages and no additional recovery was warranted. On appeal, the court reversed the determination that the fee was not liquidated damages but affirmed the dismissal of the lost-profits claim, reasoning that the parties intended the deposit to compensate for the breach, that further remedies seeking unearned interest would be against public policy, and that the claimed damages were too speculative. The court enforced the retention of the $60,000 as full satisfaction.

business & regulatoryproperty

In Howard v. Fountain, patients sued a dentist for negligence in performing a root canal and related dental care. After the dentist failed to file a timely answer, the trial court entered a default judgment on liability and later assessed damages following an ex parte hearing. The appellate court affirmed the denial of the dentist's motions to vacate the liability default, finding no good cause shown for the delay. However, it reversed the damages judgment, holding that the dentist's late answer constituted an appearance entitling him to notice of the damages hearing on unliquidated claims, which was not provided. The case was remanded for a new damages hearing.

proceduretorts & liability

This case involved a personal injury lawsuit where Robert Day was burned by acid due to a valve failure during oil well treatment on his Kentucky farm by Virginia Partners, Ltd., a Florida limited partnership. The trial court found the limited partners jointly and severally liable because the partnership's certification had lapsed in Florida and it was not registered in Kentucky, treating it as a general partnership. The Court of Appeals reversed, holding that under Florida law, the partnership retained its limited status despite the lapse (with reinstatement retroactive), and Kentucky's statutes did not automatically convert it to a general partnership for failing to register, thus protecting the limited partners from personal liability.

business & regulatorytorts & liability