In Smith v. Widener, Sandra Smith sued Tracy Widener, Stacy Currie, and Epting's estate for conversion and other claims after a dispute over her rights as beneficiary of a $75,410 deferred compensation account following Epting's death; Smith had withdrawn $40,000 after CitiStreet initially transferred the funds to her, but CitiStreet later sent the remaining $35,410 to the estate based on a competing waiver form. Smith settled with CitiStreet for $35,410 before trial, and a jury later awarded her exactly that amount against Widener and Currie on the conversion claim. The trial court denied the defendants' request for a setoff to reduce the verdict by the settlement amount. The Court of Appeals reversed, holding that when actual and punitive damages arise from the same injury, they constitute a single claim under S.C. Code Ann. § 15-38-50, so a nonsettling defendant is entitled to setoff by operation of law to prevent double recovery for the identical loss.
In State v. McKerley, Jimmy Paul McKerley appealed his convictions for criminal sexual conduct with a minor in the first degree and lewd act upon a child under sixteen, based on allegations that he sexually abused his seven-year-old daughter. The Court of Appeals reversed the convictions and remanded for a new trial, holding that the trial court erred in admitting testimony from the State’s expert forensic interviewer. The court reasoned that statements such as finding the victim’s interviews “compelling for sexual abuse,” along with related testimony about consistency, sensory details, and other indicators of abuse, improperly commented on the victim’s credibility in violation of State v. Jennings and Rule 608(a) of the South Carolina Rules of Evidence, which reserve credibility assessments exclusively for the jury. The court further concluded that the error was not harmless, given the extent of the bolstering testimony and its likely effect on the verdict in the context of the other evidence.
In State v. Coker, the circuit court revoked Phillip Coker’s probation and imposed part of his suspended prison sentence based solely on his failure to pay money. Coker appealed, arguing that the court had not made required findings on whether the violation was willful. The Court of Appeals reversed and remanded, holding that under Bearden v. Georgia and State v. Spare, probation may not be revoked for nonpayment unless the record shows specific findings: that the State proved a violation, that the probationer willfully chose not to pay or failed to make bona fide efforts to obtain funds, and, if he could not pay despite such efforts, that no adequate alternatives exist to meet the State’s interests in punishment and deterrence. The circuit court had made none of these findings.
This case is a post-conviction relief (PCR) action in which Joseph Walker challenged his convictions for kidnapping and first-degree criminal sexual conduct on grounds of ineffective assistance of trial counsel. The PCR court granted Walker a new trial, finding that counsel performed deficiently by failing to investigate a potential alibi witness (Reed) and that the cumulative effect of other alleged deficiencies prejudiced the defense. The South Carolina Court of Appeals reversed, holding that although counsel’s failure to investigate Reed was deficient under the Sixth Amendment, Reed’s PCR testimony did not meet the legal definition of an alibi and thus Walker could not show the required prejudice under Strickland v. Washington. The court further held that any other instances of deficient performance were unrelated and created no cumulative prejudice sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome. It therefore reversed the grant of PCR relief.
York County appealed after the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (DHEC) issued C & D Management a permit to build a construction and demolition debris landfill, claiming that the county's 2007 "emergency ordinance" had declared all unpermitted landfills inconsistent with its 1994 solid waste management plan and therefore barred the permit under state law. The Court of Appeals affirmed the Administrative Law Court's ruling upholding the permit. The court held that DHEC alone possesses exclusive statutory authority to determine whether a proposed landfill is consistent with local plans and ordinances, and that the county could not override this authority by enacting an ordinance that simply labeled all new landfills inconsistent; the emergency ordinance was therefore properly disregarded. The decision rested on the Solid Waste Policy and Management Act and the precedent in Southeast Resource Recovery, Inc. v. DHEC, which prohibit delegating permitting power to local governments.
The case involved Melissa Crosby's lawsuit against her former employer, Prysmian, alleging retaliatory discharge under South Carolina law for firing her shortly after she filed a workers' compensation claim for a knee injury sustained on the job. The workers' compensation commission had previously ruled in Crosby's favor, finding she suffered a compensable work-related injury, after which the circuit court granted her partial summary judgment by treating that finding as conclusive and dismissing Prysmian's affirmative defense that the claim was fraudulent, along with its counterclaims. On appeal, the South Carolina Court of Appeals affirmed, holding that the commission's factual determination was entitled to preclusive effect under collateral estoppel because the injury issue was identical, actually litigated to a final decision, and Prysmian had a full opportunity to contest it. The court rejected Prysmian's arguments that public policy or differences in proceedings warranted relitigation, noting that the fraud defense could not succeed as a matter of law once the commission's ruling was given preclusive weight.