Ruth Riffe v. William Armstrong; Deborah Nolley; Dr. Phillip Robertson; Springhaven, Inc., a West Virginia corporation; and Princeton Community Hospital, Inc., a West Virginia corporation, No. 22980 (W. Va. July 17, 1996) (Albright, J.):
Rejecting an assertion by mental health professionals that because they were assisting in involuntary commitment proceedings, they were entitled to qualified immunity in an action instituted by a respondent who sued for false imprisonment, medical malpractice, and intentional infliction of emotional distress, the Court held that although the defense of qualified immunity is generally available to those participating in good faith in an involuntary commitment proceeding, such immunity is unavailable where (i) a materially false medical certificate was employed to effectuate or continue the plaintiff's detention, (ii) such certificate was necessary to the plaintiff's detention, and (iii) the defendant made and employed the false certificate or the defendant used such certificate knowing or having reason to know it was materially false.
Judith Roush v. John Hey, Pat Buchanan, Turner Broadcasting System, Inc., a corporation, and Cable News Network, Inc., a corporation, No. 22958 (W. Va. July 3, 1996) (Recht, J.):
Reversing an award of summary judgment in a defamation action filed after a trial judge appeared on a nationally-televised program to criticize the living arrangements of a litigant who had appeared before him in a case still in litigation, the Court held (1) absolute judicial immunity applies to all "judicial acts" within the judge's subject matter jurisdiction; (2) whether an act is "judicial" depends upon (i) whether it constitutes the performance of a function normally performed by a judicial officer and (ii) whether the parties to the act viewed the judge as acting in a judicial capacity; (3) the appearance of a judge on a nationally-televised program, dedicated to the contentious discussion of politically and socially-sensitive issues, in order to vindicate a position expressed in conjunction with the judge's presiding in a pending case related to the custody of a child, is not a function normally performed by a judge and could not have been reasonably viewed by the parties to the judge's appearance as within his judicial capacity; and (4) when a judge uses his or her judicial office to vindicate personal objectives and when no party has invoked the judicial function of his or her office, then the judge's acts in furtherance of his or her personal objectives are not "judicial" and unprotected by the doctrine of judicial immunity.