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State v. St. Paul Fire And Marine Insurance Co.5/26/2000
The State of Alabama appeals from the trial court's order dismissing an indictment against St. Paul Fire and Marine Insurance Company (hereinafter "St. Paul"), a Minnesota-based corporation, for perjury in the first degree, a violation of § 13A-10-101(a), Ala. Code 1975.
The indictment against St. Paul arose out of a medical-malpractice suit relating to a 1993 incident in an operating room, as a result of which a patient, Mary McGahagin, suffered brain damage caused by bradycardia (a slowed heartrate, producing an inadequate bloodflow to the brain) during surgery. McGahagin sued the hospital where the surgery was performed, the surgeon who performed the surgery, an anesthesiology group, one of the anesthesiologists, and Wayne Zimlich, a nurse anesthetist. During the malpractice trial, Zimlich testified that McGahagin had suffered bradycardia for approximately three to five minutes during the surgery. The hospital and the surgeon were ultimately dismissed from the malpractice suit, but the anesthesiology group, the anesthesiologist, and Zimlich -- all insured by St. Paul -- were found liable and were ordered to pay damages of $22.5 million. Subsequently, Zimlich sued St. Paul and three of its employees for failure to settle the malpractice suit. During the trial of that case, Zimlich testified that, at the direction of his lawyer, the anesthesiologist, and a St. Paul employee, he had lied at the malpractice trial about the duration of McGahagin's bradycardia. Zimlich maintained that the bradycardia had actually lasted over 10 minutes, not 3 to 5 minutes as he had testified at the malpractice trial. Based on Zimlich's testimony, the State indicted both Zimlich and St. Paul for perjury in the first degree.
St. Paul filed a motion to dismiss the indictment against it for failure to charge an offense, arguing that under Alabama law a corporation could not be charged with the offense of perjury. After a hearing on the issue, the trial court granted St. Paul's motion and dismissed the indictment against it.
On appeal, the State contends that the trial court erred in dismissing the indictment against St. Paul because, it says, the Legislature intended to provide for corporate criminal liability by defining a "person" in § 13A-1-2(6), Ala. Code 1975, as "a public or private corporation." Section 13A-1-2 provides, in pertinent part:
"Unless different meanings are expressly specified in subsequent provisions of this title, the following terms have the following meanings:
"....
"(6) Person. A human being, and where appropriate, a public or private corporation, an unincorporated association, a partnership, a government or a governmental instrumentality." (Emphasis added.)
In the commentary to this section, we find the following:
"`Person' as defined in subdivision (6) covers a `human being' and includes male and female of whatever age. The definition also includes all legal persons, or entities. The precise kind of `person' required depends upon the particular offense charged, and the language of the section defining it." (Emphasis added.)
Section 13A-10-101(a), Ala. Code 1975, provides that " person commits the crime of perjury in the first degree when in any official proceeding he swears falsely and his false statement is material to the proceeding in which it is made." (Emphasis added.) The State contends that § 13A-1-2(6) and § 13A-10-101(a), when construed together, clearly indicate a legislative intent to impose criminal liability for perjury on corporations. We disagree.
In construing the language in §§ 13A-1-2(6) and 13A-10-101(a), Ala. Code 1975, we are mindful of the following prin
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