ATLANTA (Legal Newsline) - A Georgia sheriff will face a lawsuit over the death of a man in the back of a patrol car, finding there is no immunity for him simply because the car was not running.
Tift County Sheriff Gene Scarbrough, sued in his official capacity, was initially granted immunity from a lawsuit over the death of James Aaron McBrayer, as the trial court there rejected claims that a waiver from immunity existed in this case because the injuries occurred during the "use" of the patrol car "as a vehicle."
Scarbrough successfully argued the car wasn't being used as a vehicle, because it wasn't even running. The Georgia Supreme Court on Oct. 11 rejected that argument, allowing McBrayer's estate to continue pursuing its claims.
"The question here is what qualifies as the 'use' of a 'covered motor vehicle,'" the court wrote.
"If 'use' carries its ordinary meaning in these statutes, then an act is the 'use' of a motor vehicle if a 'covered motor vehicle' is being 'employed' or put into action or service.'
"That definition of 'use' in this context would certainly include employing vehicles as transportation of people and things; after all, that is the paradigmatic job of a 'motor vehicle.' But 'use' of motor vehicles would naturally include other acts as well."
Among those acts would be pulling a tow truck pulling a vehicle out of a ditch and a fire engine putting out a fire, the court wrote.
"In other words, the fact that transportation may be the most obvious 'use' of a motor vehicle does not mean it is necessarily the only way a 'covered motor vehicle' can be put in use."
It is alleged that McBrayer was tased and apprehended in April 2019. His hands and feet were restrained, and deputies left him unattended in the back of a patrol car. An autopsy said he died there as a result of excited delirium, caused by the taser.
"Under the plain language of the statutes at issue, McBrayer has asserted a 'use' of the patrol car sufficient to waive sovereign immunity," the ruling says. "Further, 'loading' the decedent into the back of the patrol car was inherently a part of the detention process because the decedent could not have been detained inside the patrol car without having been 'loaded'' inside it by the deputies."