Commonwealth Court Rejects Plaintiffs Efforts to Place the Actions of SEPTA Officials As Being Outside of the Protections of Sovereign Immunity

In the case of White v. McGill, No. 186 C.D. 2024 (Pa. Cmwlth. June 30, 2025 Fizzano Cannon, J., Wolf, J., and Leadbetter, S.J.) (Op. by Fizzano Cannon, J.), the Commonwealth Court reversed a trial court’s Orders following a trial and remanded the case back to the trial court for a substantial molding downward of the verdict.

In this case, the appellate court cut a $4.65 million dollar bus crash verdict by 90% and reduced the award to $485,000.

According to the Opinion, this case arose out of an incident during which a mother and her son were struck by a SEPTA bus while walking across the street. The Plaintiffs alleged that the accident, which resulted in fatal injuries to the mother and injuries to the son, was caused by the bus driver’s negligence.  The Plaintiffs also claimed negligence on the part of SEPTA officers who allegedly allowed the continued use of an allegedly dangerous mirror system on the buses that created blind spots for its drivers.

The Plaintiffs otherwise contended that their claims against the officers of SEPTA were not subject to the sovereign immunity that would ordinarily limit the agency’s civil liability.

The appellate court rejected the Plaintiff’s argument that SEPTA and its officers had acted outside the scope of their statutory authority and were, therefore, not entitled to a protections usually afforded to state agencies under Pennsylvania’s Sovereign Immunity Act.

Anyone wishing to review a copy of this decision may click this LINK.

Source: Article – “Philadelphia Appeals Court Slashes $4.65M Bus Crash Verdict By 90% By Aleza Furman of The Legal Intelligencer (July 1, 2025).

Source of image:  Photo by Nellie Adamyan on www.unsplash.com.