NATALIE B. SAWYER v. COMMISSIONER OF DIVISION OF CAPITAL ASSET MANAGEMENT AND MAINTENANCE & Another. ( 2024 )

NOTICE: Summary decisions issued by the Appeals Court pursuant to M.A.C. Rule
23.0, as appearing in 97 Mass. App. Ct. 1017 (2020) (formerly known as rule 1:28,
as amended by 73 Mass. App. Ct. 1001 [2009]), are primarily directed to the parties
and, therefore, may not fully address the facts of the case or the panel's
decisional rationale. Moreover, such decisions are not circulated to the entire
court and, therefore, represent only the views of the panel that decided the case.
A summary decision pursuant to rule 23.0 or rule 1:28 issued after February 25,
2008, may be cited for its persuasive value but, because of the limitations noted
above, not as binding precedent. See Chace v. Curran, 71 Mass. App. Ct. 258, 260
n.4 (2008).
COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS
APPEALS COURT
23-P-692
NATALIE B. SAWYER
vs.
COMMISSIONER OF DIVISION OF CAPITAL ASSET MANAGEMENT AND
MAINTENANCE & another. 1
MEMORANDUM AND ORDER PURSUANT TO RULE 23.0
The plaintiff brought a claim under the Wage Act, G. L.
c. 149, § 148, against the director of human resources and the
commissioner of the Division of Capital Asset Management and
Maintenance (DCAMM), seeking treble damages and attorney's fees
for allegedly unpaid wages, including salary and vacation time.
The Commonwealth filed a motion to dismiss under Mass. R. Civ.
P. 12 (b) (1) and (6), 365 Mass. 754 (1974), arguing that the
Wage Act claim was barred because the statute contains only a
narrow exception to the general rule that the Commonwealth is
immune from suit and the plaintiff did not fall in that
1Director of Human Resources of the Division of Capital
Asset Management and Maintenance.
exception. A Superior Court judge allowed the motion, and the
plaintiff appeals. We affirm.
Discussion. Under the doctrine of sovereign immunity,
"[t]he Commonwealth 'cannot be impleaded in its own courts
except with its consent, and, when that consent is granted, it
can be impleaded only in the manner and to the extent expressed
. . . [by] statute.'" Woodbridge v. Worcester State Hosp., 384
Mass. 38, 42 (1981), quoting Broadhurst v. Director of the Div.
of Employment Sec., 373 Mass. 720, 722 (1977). "The rules of
construction governing statutory waivers of sovereign immunity
are stringent." Woodbridge, supra. They require that
"[c]onsent to suit . . . be expressed by the terms of a statute,
or appear by necessary implication from them." Id.We are unpersuaded by the plaintiff's contention that the
Wage Act contains a waiver of sovereign immunity that is broad
enough to encompass her suit. In Donahue v. Trial Court of the
Commonwealth of Mass., 99 Mass. App. Ct. 180, 183-184 (2021), we
held that, while the Wage Act "expressly applies to the
Commonwealth and its instrumentalities, . . . it does so only in
certain limited circumstances." Specifically, the first
paragraph of the Wage Act states that the statutory requirements
apply to "every mechanic, workman and laborer employed by" the
Commonwealth and its instrumentalities and "every person
employed in any other capacity by it or them in any penal or
2
charitable institution." G. L. c. 149, § 148. The amended
complaint does not plausibly allege, nor does the plaintiff
argue, that her work qualified her as a mechanic, workman, or
laborer or that she was employed in a penal or charitable
institution. 2 Thus, the suit by her does not fall within the
Wage Act's limited waiver of sovereign immunity. See Donahue,
supra at 184-187.
The plaintiff suggests that Donahue was wrongly decided in
that it overlooked other language in the Wage Act. In
particular, the plaintiff relies on the sixth paragraph:
"No person shall by a special contract with an employee or
by any other means exempt himself from this section or from
section one hundred and fifty. The president and treasurer
of a corporation and any officers or agents having the
management of such corporation shall be deemed to be the
employers of the employees of the corporation within the
meaning of this section. Every public officer whose duty
it is to pay money, approve, audit or verify pay rolls, or
perform any other official act relative to payment of any
public employees, shall be deemed to be an employer of such
employees, and shall be responsible under this section for
any failure to perform his official duty relative to the
payment of their wages or salaries, unless he is prevented
from performing the same through no fault on his part."
(Emphasis added.) G. L. c. 149, § 148.
2 According to the amended complaint, "[f]rom March 18, 2018
until her termination on May 10, 2022," the plaintiff "served as
General Counsel of DCAMM." The Commonwealth argues that a
person with this title could not be considered a mechanic,
workman, laborer, or person employed in any penal or charitable
institution. G. L. c. 149, § 148. The plaintiff does not argue
otherwise.
3
We do not view the emphasized language as establishing a blanket
waiver of sovereign immunity.
Rather, as explained in Cook v. Patient Edu, LLC, 465 Mass.
548, 553 (2013), that language "imposes individual liability" on
the identified public officers if they fail to make payment of
wages in accordance with the statute. To construe it instead as
a blanket waiver of immunity would render superfluous the
provision in the first paragraph limiting the Commonwealth's
waiver to suits brought by certain subsets of employees. This
would contravene the strict rules of construction governing
waivers of immunity, see Woodbridge, 384 Mass. at 42, as well as
the basic tenet that "no word in a statute should be considered
superfluous." 3 International Org. of Masters, Mates & Pilots,
Atl. & Gulf Maritime Region, AFL-CIO v. Woods Hole, Martha's
Vineyard & Nantucket S.S. Auth., 392 Mass. 811, 813 (1984).
The plaintiff also urges that the Superior Court judge
erred in referencing model jury instructions when she analyzed
the statute's meaning. The Superior Court judge's interpretive
method is of no moment to our analysis because we interpret a
complaint's legal sufficiency de novo, giving no deference to
3 Even though the Wage Act does not authorize the
plaintiff's suit, nothing in our decision prevents the plaintiff
from seeking the wages to which she believes she is entitled
under other theories of recovery. See Wong v. University of
Mass., 438 Mass. 29, 32-37 (2002).
4
the judge's approach. See, e.g., International Bhd. of Elec.
Workers Local No. 129 Benefit Fund v. Tucci, 476 Mass. 553, 557
(2017).
Judgment affirmed.
By the Court (Massing,
Singh & Grant, JJ. 4),
Clerk
Entered: July 29, 2024.
4 The panelists are listed in order of seniority.
5