Coleman Estate Ex Rel. Coleman v. R.M. Logging, Inc.

(Filed July 26, 2010)

The majority’s judicial expansion of this statutory cause of action marks a troubling departure both from our prior deliberate intent jurisprudence and from the necessary deference we are constitutionally obligated to give to the Legislature for statutorily-created causes of actions. Heretofoi’e, we have endeavored to accord legal effect to the plain meaning and clear intent of West Virginia’s deliberate intent statute. By doing so, the Court ensured that the elements necessary to establish and maintain such an action resulted from legislative policy-making, not judicial…