## Facts

- Michael Zaborowski admitted his mother, Anna M. Zaborowski, to Hospitality Care Center of Hermitage, Inc. (Hospitality), a Pennsylvania skilled nursing facility participating in Medicare and Medicaid.
- The parties executed a written admissions agreement stating, among other things, that Hospitality would provide safe and reasonable care, a safe environment, and services aimed at achieving the resident’s highest practicable physical and mental well-being.
- Anna lived at the facility from September 4, 1997, until her death on April 15, 2001.
- Zaborowski alleged that Anna received appropriate care from 1997 through late 2000.
- In December 2000, Hospitality terminated its president and director of nursing.
- Hospitality’s directors and sole shareholders, Faye M. Cassity and Robert W. Bible, retained Nubridge Development Inc. (Nubridge) to manage and operate the facility.
- Hospitality sent residents a letter announcing the management change and representing that, as always, Hospitality’s priority was to provide quality care and a safe and comfortable environment.
- Zaborowski alleged that after Nubridge assumed management, Hospitality did not maintain Anna’s level of care; she experienced serious medical complications (including bleeding around a G-tube and the lungs, weight loss, choking, dehydration, and infections) and later died.
- Zaborowski sued Hospitality, Nubridge, Cassity, and Bible, asserting multiple theories, including breach of the admissions agreement, fraud/misrepresentation tied to the management-change letter, breach of fiduciary duty, and violations of Pennsylvania’s Unfair Trade Practices and Consumer Protection Law (UTPCPL), and sought compensatory damages, punitive damages, treble damages, and attorney’s fees.
- Defendants filed preliminary objections, including demurrers to several counts, objections to punitive damages and to requests for attorney’s fees and treble damages, and objections seeking a more specific pleading and striking of certain allegations.

## Issues

1. Whether, taking the pleaded facts as true, the complaint stated viable claims against the nursing home based on the admissions agreement and the facility’s alleged failure to provide the level of care and safety promised.
2. Whether the management-change letter’s assurances of “quality care” and a “safe and comfortable environment” could support a misrepresentation/consumer-protection theory at the pleading stage or were non-actionable general statements.
3. Whether the complaint adequately alleged a fiduciary relationship between the nursing home (or its managers) and the resident sufficient to support a breach-of-fiduciary-duty count.
4. Whether the UTPCPL could apply to the alleged deceptive representations made in connection with nursing-home residency and services, and whether the pleaded UTPCPL theory was legally sufficient.
5. Whether Cassity and Bible could be held personally liable on the pleaded allegations based solely on their roles as officers/directors/sole shareholders.
6. Whether the pleaded facts were sufficient to keep punitive damages in the case, and whether attorney’s fees and treble damages were available on the pleaded theories.
7. Whether any allegations were so vague or improper that they should be stricken or required to be pled with greater specificity.

## Decision

- The court applied Pennsylvania’s demurrer standard, accepting as true all well-pleaded material facts and reasonable inferences, and sustaining objections only when it is clear and free from doubt that the law permits no recovery on the pleaded facts.
- The court sustained defendants’ preliminary objections (demurrers) to Counts IV, VII, IX, and X.
- The court overruled defendants’ preliminary objections (demurrers) to Count VIII.
- The court overruled Hospitality’s individual demurrer to Count VI.
- The court sustained Cassity and Bible’s individual demurrers to Counts II, IV–V, and VII–XI as to them personally, eliminating those counts against the individual shareholders/officers as pleaded.
- The court overruled preliminary objections challenging the request for punitive damages, allowing punitive damages to remain pleaded.
- The court sustained preliminary objections to the requests for attorney’s fees and treble damages, striking those remedy demands as pleaded.
- The court sustained in part and overruled in part the preliminary objections seeking a more specific pleading and/or striking particular paragraphs.

## Legal Principles

- On preliminary objections in the nature of a demurrer, a court treats well-pleaded facts and reasonable inferences as true and dismisses only when the complaint shows, clearly and without doubt, that no legal recovery is possible.
- A nursing-home admissions agreement may supply enforceable obligations at the pleading stage when the plaintiff ties the alleged breach to specific undertakings in the contract (such as safe and reasonable care and a safe environment), even if the underlying dispute concerns the quality of care.
- Statements made by a facility to residents about continued quality and safety after an operational change may be tested at later stages; at the pleading stage, the court may allow certain misrepresentation/UTPCPL theories to proceed depending on how the representations are pled and linked to harm.
- A breach-of-fiduciary-duty claim requires facts showing a fiduciary relationship; ordinary provider-resident relationships, without more, may be insufficient.
- Corporate officers and shareholders are not personally liable for corporate acts solely because of their titles or ownership; personal liability requires well-pleaded facts showing a recognized basis for individual responsibility.
- Punitive damages may remain in a case at the pleading stage when the allegations, if proven, could support a finding of outrageous conduct or reckless indifference.
- Attorney’s fees and treble damages are not recoverable merely because they are requested; they require a valid statutory or contractual basis tied to a viable claim as pleaded.
- Courts may order greater specificity or strike improper matter where allegations are not stated with enough detail to permit a response or are otherwise not proper for the pleading.

## Conclusion

The Court of Common Pleas ruled on preliminary objections by trimming several challenged counts and striking demands for attorney’s fees and treble damages, while allowing key claims— including Hospitality’s exposure under Count VI, one surviving consumer-protection/misrepresentation-based count (Count VIII), and the request for punitive damages— to proceed, subject to partial repleading and paragraph-level edits ordered through the court’s specificity and strike rulings.


Zaborowski v. Hospitality Care Center of Hermitage, Inc., 2002 WL 32129508 (2002)