James A. Andersen

The case concerned a 1993 Washington statute that amended the Public Employees' Collective Bargaining Act to allow the Supreme Court to designate the Washington State Bar Association as a public employer subject to collective bargaining, after the Court had declined to amend its General Rule 12 to require such bargaining. The Bar Association challenged the statute's constitutionality. The Supreme Court held the statute unconstitutional, ruling that it violated the separation of powers doctrine by encroaching on the judiciary's exclusive authority to regulate the practice of law and control the Bar Association through court rules. The Court explained that the Bar Association functions as an arm of the judiciary under GR 12, and the Legislature could not directly override or conflict with the Court's rulemaking power in this area, even while acknowledging the statute's encouragement of collective bargaining.

labor & employmentprocedure

The case involved defendant Lynn Roderick Lough, a paramedic convicted by jury of attempted second degree rape, indecent liberties, and first degree burglary after an incident in which complainant P.A. alleged he drugged her drink during a date and sexually assaulted her while she was incapacitated. Lough denied the allegations, claiming the encounter was consensual, and appealed his convictions on the ground that the trial court erred by admitting testimony from four other women who described similar prior incidents in which he had allegedly surreptitiously drugged and sexually assaulted them. The Washington Supreme Court affirmed the convictions, holding that evidence of the other incidents was admissible under the common scheme or plan exception to show that the charged acts were manifestations of a larger design rather than to prove propensity, and that the trial court properly weighed relevance against prejudice while instructing the jury on the limited purpose of the evidence.

criminal law

This case concerns the validity of amending a criminal charging document after the state has rested its case. The defendant was charged with attempted first-degree murder arising from an incident with a police officer, but the information omitted the essential element of premeditation; after the state rested, the trial court allowed an amendment to add that element over defense objection, resulting in a conviction. The court held that the state may not amend a charging document post-rest to charge a different or greater crime unless the amendment is to a lesser degree or lesser included offense, because the federal and state constitutions require that the accused be informed of all essential elements of the charged crime to prepare a defense. The conviction was reversed and the charge dismissed without prejudice to refiling, based on the essential elements rule and precedent prohibiting such amendments.

criminal lawprocedure

This case involved the conviction and death sentence of defendant Jonathan Lee Gentry for the 1988 murder of a 12-year-old girl in Kitsap County, Washington, after she was found beaten to death with evidence including blood on the defendant's shoes and hairs consistent with his family. Gentry appealed on multiple grounds, including challenges to the admission of forensic evidence, jury instructions, the use of victim impact evidence, and constitutional claims under state and federal due process and cruel punishment provisions. The Washington Supreme Court affirmed the conviction and death sentence, holding that the trial court properly admitted scientific testing results linking the bloodstains to the victim, that the evidence was sufficient to support the verdict, and that sentencing procedures complied with statutory and constitutional requirements for capital cases. The court reasoned that prior precedents allowed rebuttal evidence in mitigation phases and that victims' rights amendments did not violate the defendant's due process protections.

criminal lawcivil rightsprocedure

The case concerned defendants Mark and Pamela Maxfield's convictions in Clallam and Jefferson Counties for manufacturing a controlled substance and possessing it with intent to deliver, based on evidence from two marijuana grow operations discovered after a public utility district employee reported unusually high electricity usage at one residence. The defendants moved to suppress evidence obtained from PUD records and an on-site investigation, arguing violations of RCW 42.17.314, which restricts law enforcement requests for utility records without a written statement of suspected crime, and also challenged their multiple convictions under double jeopardy principles. The court held that the PUD employee's voluntary disclosure and subsequent record inspection complied with the statute because no improper request preceded the information, the private investigator's observations were lawful, and the search warrant was valid. On the sentencing issue, the court applied the Blockburger test to conclude that the manufacture and possession-with-intent convictions punished distinct offenses with separate criminal intents, allowing multiple punishments in a single proceeding without violating double jeopardy.

criminal lawprocedure

This case concerned a landowner's application for a shoreline substantial development permit and variance to construct a residence on an undersized waterfront lot on Hood Canal that was mostly underwater and failed to meet minimum lot size and setback requirements under the Mason County Shoreline Master Program. The Department of Ecology denied the variance, the Shorelines Hearings Board upheld the denial, the superior court reversed, and the Court of Appeals and Supreme Court ultimately affirmed the Board's decision. The court held that the Board's denial was neither clearly erroneous under the Shoreline Management Act nor arbitrary or capricious, because the lot did not satisfy the threshold variance criteria, the owner had purchased the property with knowledge of the restrictions, and granting relief would undermine the Act's policies protecting shorelines of statewide significance. The decision turned on administrative review standards under the former APA and the self-created nature of any hardship.

environmentproperty

The case concerned a professional liability insurance policy issued to a psychologist that imposed a $25,000 aggregate sublimit on all claims (including non-sexual ones) arising from the same course of treatment once any sexual misconduct was alleged. The Washington Supreme Court, answering certified questions from the Ninth Circuit, held that this provision did not violate state public policy. The court reasoned that the sublimit bore a reasonable relationship to the heightened risk of such claims and did not improperly deny coverage to innocent victims.

torts & liabilitybusiness & regulatoryhealthcare

This case concerned whether a police officer must obtain consent from both a driver and a passenger with approximately equal control over a vehicle before conducting a warrantless search based on consent. The Washington Supreme Court held that the voluntary consent of one person with common authority over the vehicle is sufficient to justify the search, and evidence found may be used against a nonconsenting occupant. The court declined to extend its prior ruling in State v. Leach, which required consent from all cohabitants in a home, to automobile searches, citing the diminished expectation of privacy in vehicles and federal precedent on third-party consent. The decision was limited to situations where the nonconsenting party did not object and involved a permissive driver rather than a mere passenger.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involves defendant Leonicio Garza, who pleaded guilty to first degree rape after participating in the kidnapping and sexual assault of a victim, and was sentenced to an exceptional term of 200 months based on findings of extreme and deliberate cruelty. Garza appealed, claiming the trial court's supporting findings lacked record support. The Washington Supreme Court affirmed the sentence, ruling that Garza never specifically challenged the presentence report's facts or requested an evidentiary hearing to contest them, so the sentencing court could properly rely on the victim's statements, police reports, and accomplice accounts contained in the report. The court concluded these unchallenged facts justified the exceptional sentence as reflecting substantial and compelling reasons.

criminal lawprocedure

Weyerhaeuser filed a declaratory judgment action against its excess liability insurers seeking coverage for remediation costs at approximately 42 polluted sites across multiple states under Comprehensive General Liability policies issued from 1951 to 1985. Insurers moved for summary judgment on 18 sites, arguing no coverage because government environmental agencies had not filed suit or made overt threats of legal action; the trial court granted the motion for 15 sites on the ground that there was no third-party claim of liability to pay damages. The Washington Supreme Court addressed whether an insured incurs a legal obligation to pay damages under the policies when it undertakes cleanup mandated by strict-liability environmental statutes, even absent an overt agency threat, and examined precedents holding that statutory compulsion can trigger the duty to indemnify.

environmentbusiness & regulatoryproperty

This case concerns whether the King County Housing Authority, which operates low-income housing projects exempt from certain taxes under federal and state law, must enter into contracts with independent fire protection districts for services pursuant to RCW 52.30.020 or pay benefit charges levied under RCW 52.18. The Housing Authority had declined to contract or pay, relying on its statutory tax exemption, payments in lieu of taxes made to King County under cooperation agreements, and the argument that benefit charges qualify as prohibited taxes or assessments. The trial court granted summary judgment to the Housing Authority and dismissed the fire districts' claims for contracts and past charges. The core reasoning involves interpreting the scope of housing authority exemptions, the nature of benefit charges as fees versus taxes, and whether existing county agreements fulfill any contracting obligations under the fire protection district statutes.

taxespropertyfederal power

This case concerned a dispute over priority between two security interests in a farmer's 1988 apple crop. The first lender had a perfected security interest filed in May 1988 after loaning the farmer over $100,000; the farmer then delivered the crop to a commission merchant that also made a later loan secured by the same crop and filed its own financing statement in January 1989. The trial court granted summary judgment to the commission merchant/second lender, holding that the Federal Food Security Act of 1985 protected it from the prior interest, but the Court of Appeals reversed. The Washington Supreme Court affirmed the reversal, concluding that the federal statute does not preempt state law governing the creation, perfection, or priority of security interests in farm products and that a commission merchant acting as a secured lender must rely on state-law priority rules.

business & regulatorypropertyfederal power

This case involved a child custody modification dispute under Washington's version of the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction Act. After the parents' 1982 dissolution, the mother was granted custody and later moved with the child to California, while the father remained in Washington; the father petitioned to change custody based on alleged neglect, and the mother challenged the Washington court's authority to hear the matter. The superior court and commissioner asserted jurisdiction on grounds of significant contacts and emergency, but the Court of Appeals reversed, finding no subject matter jurisdiction once California became the child's home state. The Washington Supreme Court reversed the Court of Appeals, holding that a court entering a custody decree retains continuing jurisdiction to modify it if one parent still resides in the state and the child's connections remain more than slight, and that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by declining to defer to California as a more convenient forum.

family law

This case arose from a declaratory judgment action by insurers, including American Star Insurance Company, seeking a ruling on policy coverage after the insured was sued. During the appeal, American Star was declared insolvent by a Wisconsin court and placed in liquidation under that state's version of the Uniform Insurers Liquidation Act, which both Washington and Wisconsin have adopted. The Washington Supreme Court held that the action abated as to American Star because the Wisconsin order and statute require abatement of proceedings against the insolvent insurer, and the liquidator effectively abandoned any claims initiated by the company. The decision rests on principles of interstate comity and the uniform act's goals of orderly, equitable multistate liquidations that treat creditors equally. The court noted that the ruling on related policy language would apply via stare decisis to any identical American Star policies.

business & regulatoryprocedure

The case involved Keith Allan Riley's personal restraint petition alleging ineffective assistance of counsel, in violation of his Sixth Amendment rights, when he entered a guilty plea to robbery and assault charges based on an incorrect offender score that treated a prior burglary conviction as pending. After the error was discovered, the standard sentencing range increased, and Riley agreed to an amended sentence resolving multiple pending cases in exchange for charge dismissals and other concessions. The court had imposed a sentence within the corrected range, and Riley claimed his attorney failed to advise him properly about the possibility of such changes. The Washington Supreme Court affirmed dismissal of the petition, concluding that Riley did not show prejudice under the Strickland test because he was informed during the plea hearing that additional criminal history could increase the range and he benefited overall from the negotiations.

criminal lawprocedure

This case concerned the legality of a warrantless arrest of Scott Solberg on the unenclosed front porch of his home during a police investigation into a suspected marijuana grow operation, as well as the validity of an exceptional sentence imposed after his conviction for possession with intent to manufacture or deliver. The Washington Supreme Court held that the arrest did not violate the Fourth Amendment under Payton v. New York because the porch was not within the protected curtilage equivalent to the interior of the home, and the officers had probable cause based on the odor, power records, and Solberg's statements. The court also ruled that the trial court's finding of a major drug offense justified the exceptional sentence, reversing the Court of Appeals' decision to vacate it on those grounds.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved three consolidated appeals by juveniles aged 15 to 17 who were convicted of possessing or consuming alcohol, challenging the mandatory one-year revocation of their driver's licenses under Washington's "abuse and lose" statutes as a violation of equal protection under the state and federal constitutions. The Supreme Court of Washington upheld the statutes, holding that the license revocation provisions are constitutional. The court reasoned that the classification, which applies the revocation only to those aged 13 to 17, is rationally related to the legitimate governmental purposes of promoting highway safety and deterring underage drinking, as teenagers in that age group are more likely to drive and the law imposes a penalty tied to their age and driving privileges.

criminal lawcivil rights

The case involved Michael Monroe Furman, who was charged as an adult after a juvenile court declination hearing with the aggravated first degree murder of an elderly woman in her home; he confessed to the rape, robbery, and killing, which occurred when he was 17, and the sole trial issue was whether he premeditated the crime despite claims of diminished capacity from drug use. The jury convicted him on all five alleged aggravating factors and imposed a death sentence after the penalty phase. The Washington Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, finding no error in the declination, the handling of lost evidence like the marijuana pipe, or evidentiary rulings at trial. It vacated the death sentence and remanded for resentencing because state law prohibits capital punishment for offenders under age 18 at the time of the crime.

criminal law

This case involved a physician who cross-claimed against a drug manufacturer after his young patient suffered permanent brain damage from a theophylline-based medication, alleging the company failed to warn of known toxicity risks in children with viral infections and seeking damages for his own professional and personal injuries along with attorneys' fees under the Consumer Protection Act. The dispute also centered on whether sanctions were warranted for the company's alleged discovery abuses, including withholding documents such as a 1981 warning letter and a 1985 internal memo acknowledging increased toxicity reports and questioning dosage recommendations. The court addressed the legal cognizability of the physician's claims, the excessiveness of any jury damages, the propriety of fee awards, and the standards for imposing sanctions when a party withholds relevant materials rather than seeking a protective order. Core reasoning emphasized that discovery rules under the civil rules require production of information reasonably calculated to lead to admissible evidence and prohibit parties from unilaterally determining relevance.

torts & liabilityprocedurehealthcare

This case involved neighboring property owners challenging the timeliness of their judicial appeal against Grays Harbor County's issuance of a surface excavation permit to a quarry, which they claimed violated state environmental laws under SEPA. The Superior Court dismissed their application for a writ of review as untimely, finding it should have been filed within 10 days of the Board of Adjustment's decision. The court decided that the neighbors' application was timely, holding that judicial review under SEPA begins after the final administrative decision by the County Commissioners. The reasoning was that county ordinances cannot be structured to force litigants to either violate SEPA's exhaustion requirements or miss filing deadlines, and the appeal period starts only after all administrative reviews are complete.

environmentprocedure