A divided Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that Americans can’t sue the U.S. Postal Service, per the Associated Press. And that’s the case even when employees deliberately refuse to deliver mail. By a 5-4 vote, the justices ruled against a Texas landlord, Lebene Konan.
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Supreme Court Justices Shut Down Postal Lawsuit
Justice Clarence Thomas wrote for a majority of five conservative justices. He said the federal law that generally shields the Postal Service from lawsuits over missing, lost and undelivered mail includes “the intentional nondelivery of mail.”
President Donald Trump’s administration had warned that a ruling in favor of the Texas landlord would have led to a flood of similar lawsuits against the cash-poor Postal Service.
Meanwhile, in dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote that the protection against lawsuits is broad. However, she said it does not extend to situations in which employees did not deliver mail for a malicious reason. Justice Neil Gorsuch joined his three liberal colleagues in dissent.
Landlord Says Postal Workers Displayed Prejudice
Lebene Konan alleged her mail was intentionally withheld for two years. Konan, who is Black, claims racial prejudice played a role in postal employees’ actions. Konan is also a real estate agent and an insurance agent. She claims two employees at a post office in Euless, Texas, part of the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, deliberately didn’t deliver mail belonging to her and her tenants. She alleges the reason is because they didn’t like that she is Black and owns multiple properties.
According to court documents, the dispute began when Konan discovered the Postal Service had changed the mailbox key for one of her rental properties without her knowledge. The change prevented her from collecting and distributing tenants’ mail from the box. When she contacted the local post office, she was told she wouldn’t receive a new key or regular delivery until she proved she owned the property. She did so, the documents say, but the mail problems continued. Those problems didn’t stop even when the USPS inspector general instructed the mail to be delivered.
Lebene Konan And Her Tenants Missed Important Mail
The Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Postal Service even as employees allegedly marked some of the mail as undeliverable or return to sender. As a result, Konan and her tenants failed to receive important mail such as bills, medications and car titles, according to the lawsuit.
Also, Konan claims she lost rental income because some tenants moved out due to the situation. After filing dozens of complaints with postal officials, Konan finally filed a lawsuit under the 1946 Federal Tort Claims Act. That law allows some lawsuits against the government. The case focused on the reach of the special postal exemption under the law.
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Associated Press writer Mark Sherman contributed to this report via AP Newsroom.
