ST. LOUIS COUNTY — It was a quiet, sunny morning in late June when Kim Young heard the crash.
She assumed it was a car accident. But her sister, who had just arrived at the home Young rents north of Jennings to take their mother to physical therapy, delivered the bad news.
A large tree lay atop her 2018 Ford Explorer and her mother’s 2011 Chevy Aveo, blocking the driveway on Ventura Avenue where her 10-year-old son had walked just a few minutes earlier to catch a school bus.
Young only had liability coverage on her car. Her renter’s insurance won’t cover the damage. And Young’s landlord, Amy Michael, can’t get her homeowner’s insurance to cover the cost of repairs either.
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The tree had come from a neighboring property, an old rail line easement owned by ºüÀêÊÓƵ County. Michael’s insurer told her it wasn’t their responsibility because it was the county’s tree. So Young and Michael began calling the county about a claim.
Ever since the tree fell, Young has been taking the bus, catching rides with family and co-workers or using Uber. She has to get to her job as a nurse at Christian Hospital. Her 3-year-old son, Michael, has , a rare chromosomal abnormality, and needs to get to therapy sessions at Children’s Hospital three to four times a week. She has to find rides for him, too.
Her Explorer could fit her son’s wheelchair. Now, Young usually carries him with his supplies through the massive hospital complex. She also often has her 1-year-old in tow.
They missed quite a few of his therapy sessions as they readjusted to life without a car. Her son’s feeding therapy program dropped him because he missed too many appointments. Young lost her old nursing job at St. Mary’s because she missed too many shifts.
But Young was confident that the county’s insurance would cover the damage like any homeowner would if their tree fell on a neighbor’s property.
She continued making payments for the last three months on a car that no longer starts, waiting for the county insurance to come through so she could repair it.
Then, last week, she and Michael heard from the ºüÀêÊÓƵ County insurance claims adviser.
“While I cannot get into specifics on this matter I can confirm that we did have to deny her claim as the county is immune from liability under Missouri’s Sovereign Immunity laws,†the adviser from Kansas City-based Thomas McGee Group wrote to Michael, the landlord.
Young can’t afford a new car right now. She’ll have to let her lender repossess the Explorer. That’s going to “kill my credit,†she said, making it harder, if not impossible, to get another car loan.
“I literally cried,†Young said when she got ºüÀêÊÓƵ County’s response. “I’m stuck.â€
The county can do no wrong
Sovereign immunity is a concept derived from English common law — often expressed in the old maxim “the king can do no wrong.â€
Missouri has its own broad protections to limit government liability, said longtime ºüÀêÊÓƵ personal injury attorney Steve Ringkamp. The Missouri Supreme Court at one point actually abolished sovereign immunity in the state, he said, but the Legislature in 1978 reinstated it with two exceptions: when a government employee is driving or when someone can prove a public property is in a dangerous condition and the government knew about it or caused it.
“Unless they can prove that it was bad, somebody complained about it or the county was out inspecting trees and should have noticed the dangerous condition of this particular tree, I’m afraid they’re going to be out of luck,†Ringkamp said.
Young and Michael said the county’s insurance representative told them that because no one reported the condition of the tree to ºüÀêÊÓƵ County, it’s not the county’s responsibility.
The tree was one of many on a swath of brush growing on the county easement that cuts through the neighborhood in the Riverview Gardens School District. Young didn’t notice it any more than any of the other trees there.
“Nothing that gave us any clue that it was gonna fall,†she said.
Michael, her landlord, recently rehabbed the formerly abandoned house after buying it via a ºüÀêÊÓƵ County tax sale. Young is a good tenant, Michael said. She has cut her rent “as much as I can afford†and tried to help the family navigate the back and forth with insurers and the county.
“She’s a single mom with disabled kids in one of the poorest areas of ºüÀêÊÓƵ, and these guys have been yanking her around for months,†Michael said. “She can’t even get to work and back.â€
Michael is out over $2,000 for removing the tree and repairs to the property.
“Why do we even have any of this stuff?†Michael said. “All these people we pay insurance to and nobody wants to do anything.â€
Ringkamp, the attorney, said nearly every Missouri government insurance policy bars coverage except for the two conditions laid out in state statute. That has also been litigated and state courts have decided that “there’s not going to be a waiver of sovereign immunity just because insurance exists,†Ringkamp said.
Others have argued Missouri’s sovereign immunity laws violate the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment.
“Everyone else is responsible for their acts or omissions, so why isn’t the government?†Ringkamp said.
But the courts have rejected that, too, he said. His firm gets calls “weekly†for injuries that fall outside of the statute. Unfortunately, Young’s case sounds similar.
“The economics of litigation pretty much preclude finding an attorney who would be willing to handle the case,†Ringkamp said. “And it would be a long shot anyhow.â€
The claims adviser from Thomas McGee Group, ºüÀêÊÓƵ County’s insurance representative, didn’t respond to a request by the Post-Dispatch for comment. A ºüÀêÊÓƵ County spokesman said the county was looking into the situation.
Young’s sister, Jacqueline Gregware, has been providing a lot of rides lately, trips that will likely continue. At least their mother, who lives with Young and her children, has finished her hip replacement physical therapy, cutting a few appointments out of the family’s hectic schedule. Gregware is happy to help everyone get around, but she and the rest of the family don’t understand why ºüÀêÊÓƵ County is different than any other neighbor.
“It just seems so strange,†Gregware said, “that no one is accountable for it.â€