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Sindelar v. Leguia5/17/2000
Act in § 10-7-1.1:
"Pecuniary damages to the beneficiaries described under § 10-7-2 and recoverable by the beneficiaries shall be ascertained as follows:
(1) Determine the gross amount of the decedent's prospective income or earnings over the remainder of his or her life expectancy, including all estimated income he or she would probably have earned by his or her own exertions, both physical and mental."
That statutory definition is in complete harmony with the commonly accepted definition of pecuniary damages used throughout Rhode Island case law and used by persuasive authorities and creates no ambiguity in its interpretation. See e.g. Black's Law Dictionary 396 (7th ed. 1999) (pecuniary damages defined as " amages that can be estimated and monetarily compensated"). We simply perceive nothing in the plain and ordinary definition of "pecuniary damages" or in the § 10-7-1.1 determination of "pecuniary damages" establishing any requirement that a putative taker under the Act have some expectation, reasonable or otherwise, of a benefit from the life of the decedent.
Rather, we stress that § 10-7-1.1, by its plain meaning, encompasses purely economic damages to the decedent, directed to the beneficiaries in § 10-7-2. By marked contrast, we note that § 10-7-1.2, by its plain language, allows for the bringing of a claim for loss of consortium, where a pre-existing relationship between decedent and survivor is indeed relevant to recovery. Although inapplicable to the case at bar because Gregor was an adult at the time of his death, the existence of such a provision clearly indicates that if the Legislature intended damage computation under § 10-7-1.1 to encompass more than a determination of pure economic damages to the decedent, it would have so provided within that section.
Sindelar next cites our holding in Curley, the so-called "cause of death" exception case, for the proposition that this Court is willing and able to carve out exceptions to the mechanical distribution rules under the Act under certain circumstances. We disagree. In Curley, we applied this jurisdiction's well settled public policy in concluding that a tortfeasor should not benefit from his or her own wrongdoing and was thus precluded from recovery under the Act, where that tortfeasor's negligence was adjudged the proximate cause of the decedent's death. Curley, 585 A.2d at 643. In reaching that result, we gleaned ample support from Rhode Island precedent and were particularly mindful of the liberal preamble language in the so-called Slayer's Act, G.L. 1956 chapter 1.1 of title 33, providing: " his chapter shall not be considered penal in nature, but shall be construed broadly in order to effect the policy of this state that no person shall be allowed to profit by his or her own wrong." Section 33-1.1-15. In light of such a clear statement of statutory intent from the General Assembly, we concluded in Curley that any contrary interpretation and holding would have been repugnant to the stated public policy of the state and would have been in disharmony with the legislative statutory schemes relating to intestacy and distribution. We find no such analogous circumstances in the case before us. Although we certainly recognize and appreciate the desirability and importance of ongoing parental contact and support for their children, we simply ascertain no legislative intent or stated public policy, as found in Curley, requiring Rhode Island courts to test those familial bonds to decide their worthiness for recovery under the Act. Mindful that our assigned task is simply to interpret the Act, not to redraft it, any attempt to create an "absentee-parent" exception "must take place within a legislative
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