Hartford, Connecticut– As a general rule, it is difficult to file a lawsuit against US Postal Service For lost, late or mishandled mail.
But a case before the U.S. Supreme Court involves A Texas A landlord who claims her mail was intentionally blocked for two years is looking to challenge that, in a cash-strapped lawsuit. Postal service This could lead to a flood of lawsuits over the all-too-common, if frustrating, phenomenon of lost mail. This concern takes on particular resonance during the holiday season, when the volume of mail — billions of sentimental items from Christmas cards to Black Friday purchases — soars.
The case focuses on whether the special postal exemption of the Federal Tort Claims Act applies when postal employees intentionally fail to deliver letters and packages.
“I think we are going to have a significant number of mail-related lawsuits,” Frederick Liu, assistant attorney general for the Justice Department, warned the justices during oral arguments last month. He predicted that if the landlord wins the case, people will conclude that their mail didn’t arrive “because of a rude comment they heard, or what have you.”
Federal tort law allows an individual to sue the federal government for money damages if a federal employee hurts them or damages their property by acting negligently.
But Congress created multiple exceptions to the law, including one for the Postal Service, to protect it from lawsuits over lost or late mail. The exception states that the post office cannot be sued for “loss, miscarriage, or negligence in the conveyance of letters or postal articles.” The definitions of these words became the crux of the case before the Supreme Court.
Last month, some justices appeared to cast doubt on the government’s claim that the USPS is protected from such lawsuits. But concern has been expressed about opening the floodgates to frivolous lawsuits. Justice Samuel Alito suggested that people might believe that carriers intentionally did not deliver mail because they did not receive a Christmas tip or because they were afraid of “a big dog running to the door.”
“What would the consequences be if all these lawsuits were filed and had to be filed?” Alito asked. “Would a first class letter cost $3 now?”
Isha Anand, the landlord’s lawyer, accused the government of “raising concerns about endless lawsuits.” She said it was unusual for someone to suffer the level of abuse that Libin Conan did, and asserts that the USPS would still retain immunity for most damages related to postal matters even if the court ruled in the owner’s favor.
“I think these types of allegations would be rare,” she said in court.
Conan, a landlord, real estate agent and insurance agent, claims that two employees at a post office in Euless, Texas, part of the city of Dallas-Fort Worth, intentionally did not deliver mail for her and her tenants because she claimed they did not like that she was black and owned multiple properties.
According to court documents, the dispute began when Conan discovered that the key to the mailbox of one of her rental properties had been changed without her knowledge, preventing her from collecting and distributing tenants’ mail from the box. When she contacted the local post office, she was told she would not receive a new key or regular delivery until she proved ownership of the property. She did so, the documents say, but mail problems continued, even though the USPS inspector general instructed the mail to be delivered.
Conan alleges that employees marked some of the mail as undeliverable or returned it to the sender. Conan and her tenants failed to receive important mail such as bills, medications and car titles, according to the lawsuit. Conan also claims she lost rental income because some of her tenants moved out due to the situation.
After filing dozens of complaints with postal officials, Conan finally filed a lawsuit under the Federal Tort Claims Act of 1946 (FTCA), which has now made its way to the nation’s highest court. A decision in this case is expected to be issued next year.
Conan, reached by email, declined to comment while the case was still pending, on the advice of her attorney.
While a district court in Texas rejected Conan’s FTCA claims, arguing that they fell under the postal exemption, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit overturned part of that decision last year.
The justices disagreed with the lower court’s ruling that Conan’s claims were excluded because they arose from a “loss” or “miscarriage.” Instead, the justices said Coonan’s case did not fall into one of those “limited situations” because it involved the intentional act of not delivering mail.
“Because the conduct alleged in this case does not fall squarely within the ‘negligent loss, miscarriage, or transfer’ exceptions, sovereign immunity does not bar Conan’s FTCA claims,” the judges wrote.
The appeals court upheld the lower court’s decision to dismiss Conan’s separate lawsuit against individual postal workers.
USPS, which declined to comment, appealed the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Kevin Kosar, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a public policy think tank, who studies postal issues, said he believes it is incorrect for the government to argue that the postal exemption covers intentional failure to deliver mail.
Kosar said he also doubted there would be a flood of lawsuits if the court ruled narrowly in the case, wondering whether affected postal customers could find an attorney willing to sue USPS.
He asked: “What lawyer, for example, wants to file a lawsuit and spend years in court because someone spent 78 cents on a first-class stamp and his letter was lost?”