UPDATES & ANALYSIS

Dismissal of claims brought by estates of women killed in low-head dam drowning was improper, Iowa Supreme Court concludes

by Mary Grace Henderson | June 25, 2025

In Estate of Kahn v. City of Clermont, the Iowa Supreme Court reversed the district court’s decision to dismiss two estates’ claims for premises liability and negligence brought against the City of Clermont, Fayette County Conservation Board, Fayette County, and the State of Iowa. Analyzing the district court’s dismissal, which was based on sovereign immunity, public-duty doctrine, qualified immunity protections, and discretionary function immunity, the Supreme Court concluded the district court erred and remanded the matter. Justice McDermott authored the opinion on behalf of a unanimous Court.

When floating on the Turkey River Water Trail using innertubes, Vicki Hodges and her mother Sharon Kahn drowned. The pair had gone over a low-head dam, and “[a]t the base of the dam, each got caught in a recirculating current.” Known for their “[s]trong currents and recirculating water,” low-head dams have been coined “drowning machines” by the State of Iowa. The City of Clermont, the State, and Fayette County promoted the Turkey River Water Trail for recreation notwithstanding the presence of a low-head dam on the path of the trail.

Though there were signs located periodically along the route taken by Hodges and Kahn, “four of the five signs were so overgrown with vegetation that” they were not viewable to those in the water. Moreover, an exit point on the river meant to allow people to evade the dam “was so overgrown and in disrepair that it was inaccessible.” The river did not have items like safety cables or buoys, either.

Both estates sued the City of Clermont and the State of Iowa based on premises liability. Both estates also sued the defendants for negligence. Asserting recreational immunity, qualified immunity, that the plaintiffs’ petition did not satisfy a necessary heightened pleading standard, and the shield of the public-duty doctrine, Fayette County filed a pre-answer motion to dismiss. Similarly, maintaining protection under sovereign immunity, qualified immunity, public-duty doctrine, and discretionary function immunity, the State of Iowa moved to dismiss the plaintiffs’ claims. Additionally, contending the plaintiffs had not “plausibly plead[ed] a viable claim” as the public-duty doctrine and recreational immunity provided protection, the City of Clermont moved for judgment on the pleadings. Finding for the defendants on all motions, the plaintiffs’ claims were dismissed by the district court. However, the Iowa Supreme Court reversed.

First, relying on the Court’s 2025 decision in 1000 Friends of Iowa v. Polk County Board of Supervisors, the Supreme Court noted “substantive qualified immunity protections and the associated pleading standard [are] ‘inextricably intertwined’ and thus must be read together.” Consequently, the Court noted that when substantive immunity is inapplicable, the heightened pleading standard is likewise inapplicable. Here, the Court concluded ordinary notice pleading standards should be used as “the petition does not allege violations of any statutory or constitutional rights,” making the substantive qualified immunity protections and the heightened pleading requirements inapplicable. The Court also found that the district court should not have dismissed the plaintiffs’ tort claims “based on an insufficiency in the pleadings.”

Next, the Court explained that liability cannot typically be placed upon a governmental entity through the public-policy doctrine when the “plaintiff’s injury . . . results from the governmental entity’s breach of a duty owed to the public at large and not to the individual plaintiff.” By contrast, the public-duty doctrine does not apply when the alleged tortious conduct comprises misfeasance (i.e., some affirmative act) on the part of the government, rather than a failure to act. Here, because the plaintiffs had alleged that the defendants had affirmatively, yet negligently, acted to set up and maintain signage along the Turkey River, “at least some aspects” of the claims asserted by the plaintiffs were not blocked by the public-duty doctrine.

The Supreme Court also rejected the State’s argument that it was immune under the State Tort Claims Act. The State Tort Claims Act provides that monetary claims against the State are only available if the same claim would have been viable against a private party. The State cited to Iowa Code section 461C.3(1), which says a private holder of land is not liable for failure to keep property safe for recreational purposes. However, the Court pointed out that Iowa Code section 461C.2(3) defines “holder” to exclude the State (or any other public bodies), suggesting that this statute does not provide immunity to the State and ordinary tort principles would apply.

As to discretionary function immunity, the Court relied on the 1988 United States Supreme Court decision in Berkovitz v. United States for the relevant test: “(1) whether the State exercised an element of judgment or discretion, and if so, (2) whether the judgment or discretion is the type for which discretionary function immunity is designed to provide protection.” On this issue, the Court again found against the defendants. It concluded the State, bearing the burden, had not sufficiently demonstrated the plaintiffs “pleaded themselves out of court by laying out facts in their petition establishing” this affirmative defense claimed by the State.

Lastly, the Court outlined that one exception to a plaintiff’s legal action in opposition to a municipality is recreational immunity. The Court detailed this exception is for “[a]ny claim for injuries or damages based upon or arising out of . . .  a recreational activity . . . on public property where the claimed” harm was caused by “normal and expected risks inherent in the . . . activity and” where the plaintiff “was voluntarily on public property . . . and knew or reasonably should have known that the recreational activity created a substantial risk of” such harm. The Court held the plaintiffs adequately contended the women’s deaths caused by such a dam were not “normal nor expected risk[s] inherent in tubing” and that the women “neither knew nor reasonably should have known” that their tubing on that portion of the river “created a substantial risk of a low-head-dam drowning.” Consequently, the Court found a recreational immunity exception was pleaded by the plaintiffs and that the district court erred in its corresponding dismissal.

Tags: Iowa Supreme Court 2024-25