Facts: Respondent Armen Yousoufian filed suit against the Office of Ron Sims, the King County Executive, in the Superior Court for King County, alleging that the county had acted in bad faith in failing to timely and fully respond to public records requests relating to stadium financing. The trial court found that the county had been untimely and unreasonable in its response to Yousoufian’s request but had not acted in bad faith and based the damages it awarded to Yousoufian upon the minimum per day penalty of $5 established by the Public Records Act (Washington Revised Code §42.56). Yousoufian subsequently appealed to the Washington Court of Appeals, which reversed the trial court’s decision, holding that the county had acted with gross negligence, and remanded the case to the trial court, which awarded damages of $15 per day to Yousoufian. Yousoufian appealed the award and the Washington Court of Appeals again reversed the trial court. The county appealed this decision to the Supreme Court of Washington.
Question(s): Did the trial court abuse its discretion in awarding damages to Yousoufian?
Conclusion: Justice Sanders’ opinion for the Court affirmed the Washington Court of Appeals, concluding that the trial court’s award of damages of $15 per day was clearly not proportionate to the county’s extreme malfeasance as the penalty assessed was at the lower end of the range established by §42.56. Thus, the Court remanded the case to the trial court with instructions to assess a penalty, in light of a multifactor analysis considering specific mitigating and aggravating factors, at the higher end of the range established by §42.56.
Docket No. 80081-2
Petitioner: The Office of Ron Sims, et al.
Respondent: Armen Yousoufian
Briefs:
- ADN of WA, Et Al. Amicus Brief
- Adn, Et Al Amicus
- Answer to Amicus
- Answer to Briefs of Amicus
- Answer to Petition for Review
- Appellant Brief
- Petition for Review
- Reply
- Reply to Answer to Petition for Review
- Respondent Brief
- Respondent's Answer to State's Amicus
- Supplemental Brief of Petitioner King County
- Supplemental Brief of Respondent
- WA State Amicus
Argument: Tuesday, February 26, 2008 10:00am
[Source: TVW, http://tvw.org]
Audio: Washington Supreme Court
Decided: Thursday, January 15th, 2009
Prevailing Party: Armen Yousoufian (Respondent)
Vote: 5-4
Citation: Pending
Alexander
(Dissent)
Johnson
Madsen
Sanders
(Majority)
Chambers
(Concurs)
Owens
(Dissent)
Fairhurst
Johnson
(Concurs)
Seinfeld
(Pro Tem)
Note: We post only slip opinion(s) as published at the time of the decision. Please consult Washington Reports printed volumes for the opinion(s) in their final form. Each opinion should appear next to the Justice who authored it.