Court of Appeals to decide whether South Bend is liable for pothole injury

The Indiana Court of Appeals will hear oral arguments next month in a case determining whether the city of South Bend is liable for failing to fill a pothole that caused a person to suffer significant injuries.

John Murphy, the St. Joseph County auditor, sued the city of South Bend in 2024 after he stepped into a pothole and suffered a leg injury. Murphy accused the city of negligent failure to maintain its streets.

In January 2026, the trial court granted summary judgment in favor of South Bend, finding that the city’s “comprehensive plan for the re/pavement of its streets ” and its “separate protocol for addressing ‘potholes'” fell within its immunity provided in Indiana Code § 34-13-3-3(7) – the statute that grants governmental entities immunity for performing a discretionary function.

Murphy appealed the matter to the Court of Appeals shortly after the trial court’s ruling, arguing the lower court erred in granting South Bend immunity because, he argues, pothole repair is a ministerial function, not a discretionary one.

Murphy “isn’t suing because the City chose the wrong resurfacing priorities,” the appellant’s brief stated. “He’s suing because the City failed to fill potholes—a basic municipal function it was required to do.”

The case will be argued at French Lick Resort in French Lick, Indiana, at 2:45 p.m. on Thursday, June 4. The scheduled panelists are Judges Leanna Weissman, Paul Felix and Mary DeBoer.

According to court documents, around mid-March 2024, while passing through the intersection of East Jefferson and St. Louis Boulevard in the St. Patrick’s Day Parade, Murphy stepped into a pothole and fell, fracturing his patella and rupturing his quadriceps tendon.

Murphy filed his complaint shortly after, but earlier this year, St. Joseph Circuit Court Special Judge Jenny Manier ruled in favor of South Bend.

Murphy filed his appellant brief in the Court of Appeals on Jan. 30.

The city of South Bend now defends the trial court’s decision, pointing to the city’s “Rebuilding our Streets Plan,” a 10-year improvement plan created by the Department of Public Works in 2021 to lay out strategies, prioritizations and schedules to repair and improve South Bend’s streets.

According to the city’s brief, the condition of East Jefferson Boulevard “did not meet the threshold” for resurfacing in 2024, but it was already scheduled to be resurfaced the next year.

South Bend asserts that it is immune to Murphy’s claims that it failed to maintain its streets because improvements to Jefferson Boulevard were already in the planning phase at the time of his injury.

“The undisputed material facts showed that South Bend engaged in a deliberative, policy-driven process to inspect, repair, and resurface its streets while working to consciously balance current conditions and budgetary constraints,” South Bend’s brief stated.

But Murphy argues that even if the city’s resurfacing plan involves discretionary policy choices, the decision to fill or not fill a specific pothole does not.

Instead, Murphy considers the day-to-day work of filling potholes an operational decision, not a planning decision.

“The City cannot manufacture immunity by pointing to a comprehensive resurfacing plan while simultaneously maintaining separate protocols for routine pothole repair,” Murphy’s brief stated. “The two are not the same, and the City’s conflation of planning-level decisions with operational failures misapprehends the discretionary function doctrine.”

Murphy also asserts that the pothole “had a history.” According to Murphy’s brief, a man named Willie Hall reported a pothole at the same intersection where Murphy fell four months before the parade.

When a pothole is reported, the city typically creates a work order and dispatches someone to address the issue, according to South Bend’s brief.

But Murphy argues that there was no work order for the reported pothole and that the city can’t confirm whether the previously reported pothole was ever repaired before he fell.

The city of South Bend denies that claim, saying it responded to and closed out Hall’s pothole report. But the city admitted to not having a corresponding work order for Hall’s report, explaining that it was most likely resolved not by a city-contracted road patcher “but through some other means.”

The case is John H. Murphy v. The City of South Bend, 26A-CT-94.