Utah’s Supreme Court Limits Hospital Liability: University of Utah v. Tullis (2025)

In June 2025, the Utah Supreme Court issued a pivotal decision in University of Utah v. Tullis (2025 UT 17) that could profoundly affect patients injured by medical negligence at state-run hospitals. The case centers on a four-year-old child, P.T., who suffered severe brain damage during a surgery at the University of Utah Hospital in 2018 . His parents sued the hospital (which is part of the state university) for negligence, seeking compensation including over $22 million in future care costs . However, a Utah law – the Governmental Immunity Act (GIA) – caps damages in lawsuits against government entities. In 2018 that cap was about $745,200 per person . The child’s family argued that an earlier Utah Supreme Court precedent from 1989 (Condemarin v. University Hospital) had already deemed such caps unconstitutional as applied to the University Hospital, meaning they should be able to recover full damages . The new ruling in Tullis decided that Condemarin’s 1989 holding does not automatically control the constitutionality of the 2017 damages cap, reversing the lower court’s decision . In plainer terms, the Utah Supreme Court declined to invalidate the current cap based solely on the old precedent, making it harder for injured patients to bypass the legal limit on damages.

This comprehensive post will break down the Tullis decision and its implications. We’ll start with some legal background on governmental immunity and damage caps, then explain the facts and procedural history of the Tulliscase. We’ll also clarify key legal concepts (like interlocutory review, governmental immunity, summary judgment, stare decisis, and plurality opinions) in easy-to-understand terms as they come up. Most importantly, we’ll analyze how this ruling impacts injured patients’ ability to pursue full compensation from the University of Utah Hospital, why it may now be more difficult to obtain legal representation for such claims, and how the case’s reversal and remand could shape future litigation strategy. Along the way, we’ll provide historical context about Utah’s damages cap and the controversy surrounding it, so readers grasp what’s at stake for patients and public institutions alike.

Background: Governmental Immunity and Damage Caps in Utah

Before diving into the case, it helps to understand governmental immunity and damages caps in Utah. Under the doctrine of sovereign (governmental) immunity, government entities are generally protected from being sued in civil court unless they consent to the suit. This principle originates from the old notion that “the King can do no wrong,” and in modern times it means states can set conditions or limits on lawsuits against them. Utah, like other states, has a law called the Governmental Immunity Act (GIA) which partially waives immunity so that people can sue the government for negligence – but with important limitations.

One major limitation in Utah’s GIA is a cap on damages. A damages cap is a law that puts an upper limit on the amount of money a plaintiff can recover, even if a jury would otherwise award more. In Utah, this cap applies to personal injury claims against governmental entities (including state-run hospitals, universities, city governments, etc.). The idea behind such caps is typically to protect public funds from “blockbuster” verdicts and to help governments predict and insure against liability . Proponents argue that unlimited liability could drain taxpayer resources or make it too costly for government agencies (like public hospitals) to operate, whereas a cap provides a measure of financial certainty. The trade-off, of course, is that an injured person might not receive full compensation for serious injuries.

It’s worth noting that the cap only applies to government defendants . If a private hospital in Utah commits malpractice, there is no overall cap on compensatory damages (though Utah does cap non-economic damages – things like pain and suffering – at around $450,000 in private medical malpractice cases). But for the University of Utah Hospital (a state entity) or other government providers, the GIA’s cap limits total recovery for one person’s injuries. This means even economic losses (like medical bills and lost future earnings) are subject to the limit when suing a state hospital, which is a significant restriction. The cap amount has changed over time: in the late 1970s it was as low as $100,000 per person ; by 2017 (the version at issue in this case), it had increased to $745,000 (adjusted annually for inflation) . In fact, Utah law now provides a mechanism to adjust the cap each year, and also allows a victim to petition a state Board of Examiners for payment of damages above the cap in extraordinary cases . However, that Board process is essentially an appeal for legislative or executive clemency – it’s not an enforceable right to full damages. In practice, the statutory cap is typically the effective maximum.

The Condemarin Precedent (1989): Old Battle Over Damage Caps

Utah’s struggle over damage caps isn’t new. A key part of the Tullis case involves Condemarin v. University Hospital, a Utah Supreme Court decision from 1989. In Condemarin, patients who were victims of medical malpractice at the University Hospital challenged the constitutionality of the GIA’s damages cap in effect at that time . Back then, the law effectively imposed a $100,000 cap on injury claims against an uninsured government entity (the law allowed higher recovery if the entity had insurance coverage above that amount, but otherwise $100k was the ceiling) . The plaintiffs in Condemarin argued that this cap violated their rights under the Utah Constitution.

In a noteworthy decision, the Utah Supreme Court agreed that the $100,000 cap was unconstitutional – at least as it applied to the University Hospital . However, Condemarin was a plurality opinion, meaning the justices were split in their reasoning. There were five justices on the case. Three of them concurred in the result (invalidating the cap for the University Hospital patients), but each of those three wrote a separate opinion with a different rationale . Justice Christine Durham wrote the lead opinion, finding the cap violated both due process and equal protectionprinciples of the state constitution . One justice (Zimmerman) agreed with parts of her due process analysis but not the rest . Another (Stewart) based his concurrence on an extensive equal protection analysis of his own . Two other justices dissented, presumably believing the cap was constitutional. The only thing a majority agreed on was the bottom-line holding: “the recovery limits statutes are unconstitutional as applied to University Hospital.” In other words, the court struck down that specific $100,000 cap for that specific context (suits against the University Hospital).

Because there was no single majority opinion explaining why the cap was unconstitutional, Condemarin has what lawyers call “limited precedential value” . In a situation like that, future courts can take the outcome as precedent (i.e. you can cite Condemarin for the proposition that that particular cap was invalid as applied to the University Hospital), but you can’t easily extend its reasoning to new scenarios since there was no unified rationale (this is sometimes handled using the so-called Marks rule for pluralities, but in Condemarin even the rationales were so disparate that only the narrow result binds) . Later Utah cases recognized this, expressly stating that Condemarin’s holding was “encapsulated in one sentence” and that its reasoning wasn’t a controlling rule beyond those facts .

Importantly, the law itself changed shortly after Condemarin. In fact, even before the Utah Supreme Court issued the 1989 decision, the Utah Legislature had already repealed the old $100,000 cap statutes in 1983 and replaced them with a new set of provisions that allowed higher limits . Over the years, the Legislature continued to tweak the GIA. In 2004, it overhauled the Act (recodified it under Title 63G) and by then set higher base limits and an inflation adjustment formula . By 2017, the per-person cap for personal injury had grown to roughly $583,900 in the statute, which by inflation adjustment was $745,200 for incidents occurring in mid-2018 . The presence of the Board of Examinersprocess (a special panel that can approve paying claims above the cap in meritorious cases) is another difference that did not exist in the exact same form back in 1989 .

All this background set the stage for a clash in Tullis: the plaintiffs argued that despite tweaks in the law, Condemarin’s core holding – that a damages cap is unconstitutional as applied to the University Hospital – should still govern. The University, on the other hand, argued that Condemarin was essentially obsolete: it was a splintered decision, the law had materially changed, and thus the 1989 case could not dictate the outcome for the 2017 cap .

The Tullis Case: A Devastating Injury and a $22 Million Claim

In July 2018, a four-year-old child (identified in court documents as “P.T.”, but we’ll call him “the Child”) underwent surgery at the University of Utah Hospital, a large teaching hospital in Salt Lake City. Tragically, during the procedure the Child experienced a massive air embolism, meaning a large air bubble entered his bloodstream and caused catastrophic injury . Although the Child survived the incident, he sustained severe brain damage as a result . He was left permanently disabled, with profound impacts on his ability to move, communicate, and live a normal life. The case is heartbreaking – the kind of worst-case scenario every parent fears.

In 2019, the child’s parents (John and Amelia Tullis) filed a lawsuit on his behalf against those they believed responsible, including the University of Utah (since its hospital and staff were involved) . They alleged that the healthcare providers were negligent in their care, which led directly to the air embolism and the Child’s injuries . In medical malpractice terms, this means they claimed the providers failed to meet the standard of care during the surgery. The suit sought damages for the Child’s pain and suffering, the parents’ emotional anguish, and the enormous medical and care expenses that would be required for the Child’s lifetime of disability .

An expert for the Tullis family estimated that the Child’s future medical and care costs alone would exceed $22 million . This number is staggering but not surprising given the circumstances – for a young child with severe brain injury, costs include full-time caretakers, ongoing medical treatment, rehabilitation, specialized equipment, and so on, likely for many decades. On top of that, there are non-economic damages (the loss of a normal life, the child’s pain, the parents’ anguish at their child’s suffering) which, while harder to quantify, are very real. In a lawsuit against a private hospital or doctor, a jury could award all these categories of damages according to the proof at trial. In fact, in a famous Utah case (Judd v. Drezga, 2004), a jury awarded over $1 million in non-economic damages to a child with a similar brain injury (that award was later reduced due to a different cap on non-economic damages) . For the Tullises’ case, a full uncapped compensation might well run into tens of millions of dollars if liability was established.

However, because the University of Utah Hospital is a government entity, the Governmental Immunity Act’s caploomed as a barrier. Under the 2017 GIA, any damages awarded “for one person in any one occurrence” against a government defendant would be capped at $745,200 (for incidents on or after July 1, 2018) . Essentially, even if a jury decided the Tullis family should receive $22 million to cover the Child’s needs, the court would be required by law to reduce that award to ~$745,200. The University of Utah’s lawyers moved early in the case to enforce this cap.

Motion for Partial Summary Judgment – and What That Means

During the pre-trial phase, the University (the defendant) filed a motion for partial summary judgment on the damages cap issue . Summary judgment is a legal procedure where one party asks the judge to decide some aspect of the case without a trial, on the basis that the material facts are not in dispute and the law clearly favors that party on that issue. Here, it was a partial summary judgment motion because the University wasn’t seeking to dismiss the case entirely; rather, it sought a ruling that no matter what, the family’s recovery would be limited to the cap amount of $745,200. If granted, this would mean even if the jury later found the hospital negligent and assessed damages at, say, $22 million, the court would cap the judgment at $745k. Essentially, the University wanted the cap applied as a matter of law.

From the University’s perspective, this was a critical strategic move. Locking in the cap early would shape any settlement talks and the course of litigation. Notably, if the cap definitely applies, the most the University will ever have to pay is $745k – so they might be less inclined to settle for anything much higher than that (since going to trial doesn’t risk a bigger payout beyond the cap). For the plaintiffs, conversely, getting around the cap was key to having any hope of covering the Child’s needs. $745,200 versus $22,000,000 is an almost unfathomable gap – it would leave the family with only a few cents on the dollar of their actual expenses (the rest likely falling to the family, charity, or taxpayer-funded programs like Medicaid).

The Tullises’ legal argument against the summary judgment was straightforward: they contended that the cap was unconstitutional as applied to this case, and they pointed to the Condemarin precedent as the answer . Essentially, their position was, “This exact hospital had a cap struck down in Condemarin, and nothing has changed to make that precedent inapplicable – so the court should follow stare decisis (precedent) and refuse to apply the cap.” In making this argument, the Tullises did not present new evidence or independent proof that the cap was unconstitutional; they relied exclusively on the existing case law, chiefly Condemarin . They also argued alternatively that if the judge didn’t think Condemarin resolved it outright, they should be allowed to conduct discovery (gather evidence) on the cap’s applicability . For instance, they might seek information about the hospital’s insurance, the legislative rationale for the cap, how the cap affects budgets, etc., to build a constitutional case.

The University’s response was to attack the applicability and validity of Condemarin. They made three main points in opposition :

1. Plurality Decision: Condemarin was a plurality opinion with a narrow holding – meaning it doesn’t have a broad precedential rule that automatically governs new situations . Because no majority agreed on the reasoning, its value as binding precedent is limited to its exact facts (University Hospital + $100k cap).

2. Law Changed & Presumption of Constitutionality: The statutes at issue in Condemarin were repealed, and the Legislature enacted a different damages cap, presumed constitutional . Essentially, the University noted that the cap is now higher and structured differently (so it’s not the same law Condemarin struck), and also pointed out that normally laws are presumed valid – they argued Condemarin improperly flipped the burden by making the government prove the cap’s constitutionality, whereas typically the challenger must prove unconstitutionality .

3. “Not good law”: The University outright argued that Condemarin “is not good law” today because of how it handled the constitutional analysis (specifically that the Condemarin plurality, according to the University, “reversed the traditional presumption of constitutionality” by requiring the law’s proponents to justify it) . This was basically a contention that Condemarin was wrongly decided or at least outdated.

The Trial Court’s Ruling

The Third District Court (Salt Lake County) judge, Adam Mow, considered these arguments and sided with the Tullises on this point . In 2023, Judge Mow denied the University’s motion for summary judgment, meaning he refused to apply the cap at that stage . His reasoning, as summarized in his ruling, was that Condemarin “remains good law” and necessarily determined that the 2017 cap is also unconstitutional as applied to the University .

In essence, the judge said: Look, Condemarin did strike a damages cap for University Hospital cases, and although it was a plurality, the holding that the cap was unconstitutional was joined by a majority of justices . The specifics of the statutes have changed (the cap is higher now), but the Legislature merely “increased the damage cap” without altering the fundamental nature of having a cap . The trial court noted that the cap had been “left largely intact” in principle (just at a different dollar figure) . Therefore, in the court’s view, the holding of Condemarin still binds lower courts – meaning a trial court must follow it unless and until the Utah Supreme Court itself says otherwise . Judge Mow addressed the University’s counterarguments as well:

• He acknowledged it was a plurality but pointed out that while the justices differed on why, a majority did agree the cap was unconstitutional, so that outcome is binding authority .

• He rejected the idea that legislative changes overruled Condemarin. Raising the cap amount, in his view, did not cure the constitutional problem identified – it was “still a cap and unconstitutional” by the same logic .

• On the burden of proof issue (presumption of constitutionality), the judge noted that Utah appellate courts had continued to cite or recognize Condemarin in the years since, implying it wasn’t abandoned, and thus he wasn’t going to declare it void on that basis .

Having concluded Condemarin’s holding “binds this Court,” Judge Mow denied the cap enforcement. This was a big win for the Tullises at that stage – it meant, at least for now, their lawsuit could proceed without the handicap of a damages ceiling. If it went to trial, the jury could award full damages, and presumably the cap would not be applied (unless a higher court intervened).

However, the University of Utah wasn’t about to simply accept that and proceed to a potentially uncapped jury trial. Instead, the University took the unusual step of seeking an interlocutory appeal to the Utah Supreme Court .

Interlocutory Appeal to the Utah Supreme Court

Normally, under court procedures, a party can only appeal a case after final judgment (when the trial is over and the case is fully resolved in the lower court). An interlocutory appeal is an exceptional mechanism that allows a party to appeal a trial court’s ruling before the case is finished. It’s basically an early appeal on a critical issue that could materially affect the outcome. Utah’s rules (like those of many jurisdictions) permit interlocutory appeals only if the appellate court grants permission, usually reserved for situations where an important legal question needs clarification and waiting until after trial would be inefficient or unfair.

In this case, the University petitioned the Utah Supreme Court to take the interlocutory appeal on the question of the damages cap. They argued that the trial court had effectively decided a constitutional issue (saying the cap can’t apply) based on Condemarin, and that this presented a significant legal question: Does Condemarin control the constitutionality of the current (2017) GIA cap? . The Utah Supreme Court agreed to hear the appeal, framing the issue essentially as whether Condemarin v. University Hospital (1989) is controlling precedent for the question of the 2017 damages cap’s constitutionality .

This was somewhat narrow – note that the Supreme Court did not say it would directly decide whether the 2017 cap is constitutional or not; rather, it would decide if that issue was already settled by the prior case (and thus the lower court was right or wrong to consider itself bound). That nuance is important for the outcome.

The case was argued in front of the Utah Supreme Court in October 2024 . Because two of the court’s members recused themselves (possibly due to conflicts or prior involvement), two judges from the Utah Court of Appeals sat by designation to fill out the panel . Justice Jill M. Pohlman authored the unanimous opinion of the court (with the other justices and substitute judges all joining) . This means, unlike Condemarin, the Tullis decision had a clear majority voice and thus is a strong precedent going forward.

Let’s break down what the Utah Supreme Court decided and why.

The Utah Supreme Court’s Decision in

University of Utah v. Tullis

In June 2025, the Utah Supreme Court issued its decision, reversing the trial court and sending the case back for further proceedings . The core holding: Condemarin does not control whether the 2017 damages cap is constitutional . In plainer terms, the Court ruled that the old 1989 decision by itself isn’t enough to strike down the current cap – the constitutionality of the current law needs to be analyzed on its own merits, not assumed from Condemarin. This was a win for the University (and the State) in the sense that the cap remains potentially applicable, but the Supreme Court notably stopped short of declaring the new cap constitutional outright . Instead, it remanded (sent back) the case to the lower court to consider the issue anew, including allowing the Tullises to pursue their request for discovery related to the cap .

Let’s unpack the reasoning step by step, focusing on a few key legal concepts that guided the Court: stare decisis(precedent), plurality precedent, and the differences between the 1989 cap and the 2017 cap.

Stare Decisis vs. Changing Law: Why

Condemarin

Wasn’t Controlling

Stare decisis is the legal principle that courts should follow their prior decisions in order to ensure consistency and stability in the law. In general, if the Utah Supreme Court has established a rule in an earlier case, a later panel of the Court will adhere to that rule unless there’s a strong reason to depart from it. In the Tullis case, the parents (Tullises) argued that stare decisis required the courts to stick with Condemarin’s holding – essentially, Condemarin “already decided this issue” and had been relied on for decades . They suggested that Utahns have counted on the Condemarinprecedent for 35+ years as guaranteeing a victim’s right to full compensation from the University Hospital . They also argued that the hospital hadn’t met the heavy burden required to overturn precedent (because usually to overrule a prior case, a party must convince the court that the precedent was clearly wrong or unworkable).

However, the Supreme Court did not view Condemarin as a broad precedent on this matter – and thus they did not see it as binding under stare decisis for the 2017 law. Why? The answer lies in the unique nature of Condemarin as a splintered plurality decision and the fact that the statutory landscape had changed.

Justice Pohlman’s opinion makes a few critical points:

• Plurality with Narrow Holding: The Court emphasized that Condemarin was a fractured decision with no majority rationale, which inherently limits its reach . The only precedential weight it carries is the precise result (invalidating the $100k cap as applied to University Hospital). The reasoning in Condemarin (the why) did not have consensus, so there isn’t a clear legal test or principle from it that can be applied to new circumstances . “No one opinion stated the rationale of a majority” in Condemarin, so future courts can rely only on the outcome, not the varied analyses .

• Different Statute, Different Facts: The Court then looked at the 2017 cap and flatly stated: “The easy answer is no” – the statutes challenged in Tullis are not the same as those in Condemarin . The 1989 cap was a flat $100,000 (with allowance up to insurance coverage) which was deemed unconstitutional; the 2017 cap is higher in amount ($745k), applies regardless of insurance, and adjusts for inflation . Because the statutes have “different terms,” the mere fact that one version was struck down doesn’t automatically mean the new version fails . Justice Pohlman used a helpful analogy: just as a holding in one case doesn’t automatically apply to a case with different facts, a holding doesn’t automatically apply to a statute with different terms . In other words, precedent isn’t transferrable by assertion – you have to do the work of comparing the rationale to the new scenario, and here there was no single rationale to carry over, and significant statutory differences to boot.

• No Majority Rationale to Extend: The Court noted that if Condemarin had established a clear legal test (say, for example, “a cap below $X violates equal protection because of Y”), then the Tullises could try to show the new cap also violates that test. But since “Condemarin left us no majority rationale to apply, its reach is necessarily limited.” . They explicitly pointed out: we cannot, for instance, do a due process analysis of the new cap using Condemarin’s reasoning, because a majority in Condemarin never agreed the old cap violated due process in the first place . Similarly, we can’t just say “well, they struck one cap so this cap is also struck” without an underlying reasoning framework. That would basically be treating Condemarin as an automatic rule, which it was not. The Court quipped that this conclusion “may seem overly simple” but it’s dictated by how precedent works .

• Amendments Invite Fresh Review: The justices also reasoned that even if Condemarin had upheld an earlier law, a changed law could be looked at anew . This was a nod to the idea that legislative changes matter. They cited an earlier Utah case indicating that if a statute is amended, it might be those very amendments that raise new constitutional problems (or solve old ones) . So it would be illogical if a statute could never be re-examined just because a prior version got a pass, and conversely it makes sense that a prior strike-down doesn’t irrevocably doom future versions without examination. Basically, each iteration of a law can be tested on its own merits.

Given these points, the Utah Supreme Court held that the district court erred in treating Condemarin as automatically controlling . By simply applying Condemarin’s outcome to the 2017 law “without more,” the trial judge went too far . The Supreme Court made it clear: more analysis is needed to determine the 2017 cap’s constitutionality; you can’t short-circuit that by invoking Condemarin.

It’s important to highlight that this decision was as much about process as outcome. The Supreme Court did not say “the cap is fine” or “the cap is unconstitutional” in this ruling. Instead, it said Condemarin alone doesn’t decide it, so the issue is still open and must be properly litigated.

Plurality Opinions: A Quick Explanation

(Since the concept of a plurality decision was central here, let’s briefly explain it.)

A plurality opinion occurs when a court (usually an appellate court with multiple judges) decides a case, but no single opinion garners a majority of the judges’ votes. For example, in a seven-justice court, if three justices sign onto Opinion A, two justices sign onto Opinion B, and two dissent entirely, Opinion A might announce the judgment but it’s not a majority opinion. It’s a plurality. The reasoning in a plurality opinion is not binding precedent except for whatever narrow outcome those few justices agreed on with others. Courts often say only the “narrowest grounds” agreed to by a majority of the judges will have precedential effect. In Condemarin, as we saw, three justices agreed the cap was unconstitutional but for differing reasons, so the only thing binding future courts was that specific end result (cap can’t apply to University Hospital cases under the old law) . The nuances of why were not authoritative beyond that case. This contrasts with a normal majority opinion (say 5 out of 7 justices agree on one reasoning), which sets a clear rule for similar cases.

The Utah Supreme Court in Tullis basically treated Condemarin as a case with a “tightly circumscribed holding” due to its plurality nature . They even quoted a legal scholar to emphasize that for anything to be precedential, it must have the majority’s vote . So, Condemarin gave a precedent (cap unconstitutional as applied then), but not a general principle to directly apply to new caps with different parameters.

Differences Between 1989’s Cap and 2017’s Cap

The Court also catalogued how the statute at issue in 2018/2019 (when the Child was injured and the suit filed) differed from the one in the 1970s/80s that Condemarin dealt with :

• Amount: The old cap was $100,000 per person, which in the context of a major injury is extremely low (even by late-1980s standards). The current cap in 2017 was $745,200 as applied to the Tullis case – obviously higher. It’s still much lower than the $22 million needed here, but it’s not as draconian as $100k was. The legislature had increased the cap multiple times since the 80s, showing an attempt to mitigate the harshness somewhat .

• Flat vs. Insurance-adjusted: The old law limited recovery to $100k unless the government had purchased liability insurance above that amount, in which case the plaintiff could get up to the insurance limits . In other words, if the University Hospital had, say, a $1 million insurance policy, the court could award up to $1 million; but if they were self-insured or only carried the minimum, the plaintiff was stuck at $100k. The new law, by contrast, sets a firm limit regardless of insurance . The University Hospital now could be self-insured or have a large insurance fund, but legally it won’t have to pay more than the cap figure. (The University in Tullis actually pointed out another modern provision: if someone’s damages are capped, they can present a claim for the excess to the Board of Examiners – something Condemarin didn’t consider, since that mechanism didn’t exist then. It’s not a true legal remedy, but it’s a difference in how the statutory scheme works.)

• Inflation Adjustment: The 2017 GIA includes a method to adjust the cap for inflation every year . For example, the law pegged the base at $583,900 in 2014, and by 2018 this rose to $745,200 via the formula . The old statutes had no inflation clause – which is partly why the cap remained $100k for many years, steadily eroding in real value until the legislature repealed it. The presence of inflation adjustment means the cap shouldn’t remain static and become absurdly low over time; it will grow (though whether it grows adequately to match real costs is debatable).

Given these distinctions, the Supreme Court’s position was: the 1989 holding was limited to the specific $100k cap under the old provisions, and one cannot simply say a $745k inflation-adjusted cap “must” be unconstitutional too without actually analyzing it under constitutional principles . The Court specifically disagreed with the Tullises’ stance that the differences were not significant ; the justices thought the differences are significant enough to require fresh consideration.

What the Supreme Court Decided (and Didn’t Decide)

To sum up the decision: The Utah Supreme Court reversed the district judge’s order that refused to apply the cap . However, the Supreme Court did not direct the lower court to actually grant the cap either . Instead, it remanded the case for the district court to proceed with analyzing the cap’s applicability properly. Why the nuance? Because the district court had originally stopped its analysis at “Condemarin controls, so I don’t need to consider anything else.” The Supreme Court is saying, “No, Condemarin by itself doesn’t resolve it – you need to consider the constitutional question anew (and the plaintiffs’ request for discovery, etc.).” They explicitly noted the trial court hadn’t ruled on the Tullises’ alternative request for discovery since it thought Condemarin decided the matter; now, on remand, that request should be addressed . The Tullis opinion states: “We stop short, however, of directing the district court to grant the University’s motion.” In other words, the Utah Supreme Court didn’t say “the cap absolutely applies.” It left the door open for the Tullis family to try to prove the cap is unconstitutional under current law, but they’ll have to do so with proper evidence and arguments, not just by citing Condemarin.

Key takeaways from the decision:

• The 2017 damages cap remains in play for now – Condemarin can’t be used as an automatic trump card to ignore it .

• Injured plaintiffs can still challenge the cap’s constitutionality, but they must do so directly (likely invoking provisions of the Utah Constitution such as the open courts clause, uniform operation of laws (equal protection), due process, etc., and meeting the usual burden to show a law is unconstitutional) – rather than relying on a 35-year-old plurality precedent.

• The case was sent back to the trial court to allow further proceedings, which might include fact-finding about the cap’s justification and effects (for example, evidence on how the cap impacts victims or how it protects state finances, etc.).

• The Supreme Court left it to the lower court first to decide whether to grant discovery and then possibly to rule on summary judgment again with a full analysis, and hinted that eventually the constitutionality issue could come back up to the Supreme Court once it’s properly briefed and decided on the merits.