Are there specific immunity rights protecting government actors from lawsuits filed in State Court, similar to those in federal civil rights cases?
Yes. But, the relevant immunity is called “official” immunity. The analysis often ends up with the same result, yet it is very different. Borrowing from the waiver language in the GTCA and in the analogous Municipal statute, an individual governmental actor is protected from suit, where he or she has “discretion” on how to act; there is no protection for failure to act in accordance with a “ministerial” (mandatory) act. This distinction can be tricky. In addition to the examples above, consider a claim for an illegally maintained roadway. Where a governmental actor has discretion over how to build a road, or how to inspect a road, the actor is protected from suit by “official” immunity. On the other hand, the failure to build a road according to accepted mandatory engineering practices, or the abject failure to inspect the safety of a road damaged by a flood, may not be protected by “official” immunity.
