Background
In August 2020, Amarylis Fisher was struck and injured by a bus in Bangor, Maine. The bus may have been operating on a route of the Community Connector, a regional public transit system serving the City of Bangor, five surrounding municipalities (Hampden, Veazie, Orono, Old Town, and Brewer), and the University of Maine. Bangor oversees most day-to-day operations of the system, but the extent of the Municipalities’ involvement is disputed. The parties also dispute whether the bus that struck Fisher was on a Community Connector route or an intracity Bangor route — a distinction with legal significance because the buses are outwardly identical.
Fisher filed suit in Penobscot County Superior Court in July 2022, alleging that the defendants were vicariously liable for their bus driver’s negligence and that the Community Connector constituted a joint venture making each participant jointly liable. The five Municipalities moved for summary judgment, arguing they were immune from suit under the Maine Tort Claims Act (MTCA). The Superior Court denied the motion, finding that the Municipalities had not shown the undisputed facts negated the existence of a joint venture. The Municipalities appealed.
The Court’s Holding
The Maine Supreme Judicial Court dismissed the appeal as interlocutory and declined to reach the merits of the immunity question. While the Court acknowledged that denials of immunity-based dispositive motions are generally subject to immediate interlocutory review, it noted a well-established exception: interlocutory review is unavailable when immunity turns on underlying factual disputes that must first be resolved by the trial court.
The dispositive immunity question under the MTCA was whether the Municipalities were “using” the bus within the meaning of 14 M.R.S. § 8104-A(1)(A) — the statutory exception to governmental immunity for negligent use of a motor vehicle — which the Court has construed to require “some measure of direct control” over the vehicle or its operator. That question, in turn, depends on whether the bus was part of the Community Connector system and what role the Municipalities actually played in its operation. Because the summary judgment record left those factual questions unanswered, the Court held that the trial court must make the necessary factual findings before immunity can be resolved as a matter of law. The Court also declined to address the parties’ arguments regarding waiver of immunity through insurance coverage.
Key Takeaways
- Under the MTCA, governmental immunity for motor vehicle negligence requires a showing that the municipality had “some measure of direct control” over the vehicle or its driver; indirect or attenuated relationships are insufficient.
- Interlocutory review of immunity denials is not available where the immunity question depends on unresolved factual disputes — the trial court must first make the necessary findings of fact before the Law Court can assess immunity as a matter of law.
- The nature of a municipality’s relationship with a co-participant in a joint transit operation directly informs whether the municipality exercised the requisite direct control to fall within the MTCA’s motor vehicle exception.
- The Court left open, for trial court resolution, both the direct-control question and the insurance-waiver question under MTCA § 8116.
Why It Matters
This decision clarifies the procedural limits on the MTCA’s interlocutory appeal doctrine, reinforcing that municipalities cannot use immunity appeals to escape trial court fact-finding when the immunity defense itself turns on disputed facts. Defense counsel for governmental entities should be prepared to develop a complete factual record on control and operational involvement before seeking appellate review of immunity rulings.
For plaintiffs injured by vehicles in regional transit systems, the decision is significant because it keeps the courthouse door open where the scope of municipal involvement in a shared transit operation is genuinely contested. Municipalities participating in multi-party transit arrangements should be aware that ambiguity about their operational role — rather than clearly resolving immunity in their favor — may prevent them from securing early dismissal on MTCA grounds.