Slocum v. Food Fair Stores of Fla., Inc.
| Citation | 100 So.2d 396 |
| Parties | Julia SLOCUM and Homer V. Slocum, her husband, Appellants, v. FOOD FAIR STORES OF FLORIDA, Inc., a Florida corporation, Appellee. |
| Decision Date | 14 February 1958 |
| Court | United States State Supreme Court of Florida |
Britton, Hodges & Hyman, Miami, for appellants.
Brown, Dean, Adams & Fischer, Miami, for appellee.
This appeal is from an order dismissing a complaint for failure to state a cause of action. Simply stated, the plaintiff sought money damages for mental suffering or emotional distress, and an ensuing heart attack and aggravation of pre-existing heart disease, allegedly caused by insulting language of the defendant's employee disrected toward her while she was a customer in its store. Specifically, in reply to her inquiry as to the price of an item he was marking, he replied: 'If you want to know the price, you'll have to find out the best way you can * * * you stink to me.' She asserts, in the alternative, that the language was used in a malicious or grossly reckless manner, 'or with intent to inflict great mental and emotional disturbance to said plaintiff.'
No great difficulty is involved in the preliminary point raised as to the sufficiency of damages alleged, the only direct injury being mental or emotional with physical symptoms merely dervative therefrom. Kirksey v. Jernigan, Fla., 45 So.2d 188, 17 A.L.R.2d 766. While that decision would apparently allow recovery for mental suffering, even absent physical consequences, inflicted in the course of other intentional or malicious torts, it does not resolve the central problem in this case, i. e. whether the conduct here claimed to have caused the injury, the use of insulting language under the circumstances described, constituted an actionable invasion of a legally protected right. Query: does such an assertion of a deliberate disturbance of emotional equanimity state an independent cause of action in tort?
Appellant's fundamental argument is addressed to that proposition. The case is one of first impression in this jurisdiction, and she contends that this Court should recognize the existence of a new tort, an independent cause of action for intentional infliction of emotional distress.
A study of the numerous references on the subject indicates a strong current of opinion in support of such recognition, in lieu of the strained reasoning so often apparent when liability for such injury is predicated upon one or another of several traditional tort theories. See annotation 15 A.L.R.2d 108; Wade, Tort Liability for Abusive Language, 4 Vanderbilt L.Rev., p. 63; Prosser, intentional Infliction of Mental Suffering; a New Tort, 37 Mich.L.Rev. 874; Magruder, Mental and Emotional Disturbance and the Law of Torts, 49 Harv.L.Rev. 1033. Cf. Cason v. Baskin, 155 Fla. 198, 20 So.2d 243, 168 A.L.R. 430, quoting Sec. 4, Declaration of Rights, Fla.Const. F.S.A.
Appellee urges that we are foreclosed by the case of Mann v. Roosevelt Shop. Inc., Fla., 41 So.2d 894, 895, wherein the Court stated: But that language was obviously confined to those cases where an attempt is made to state an action in defamation for injury to reputation as opposed to peace of mind, and we find no other opinion of this Court which bears directly on the present issue.
A most cogent statement of the doctrine covering tort liability for insult has been incorporated in the Restatement of the Law of Torts, 1948 supplement, sec. 46, entitled 'Conduct intended to cause emotional distress only.' It makes a blanket provision for liability on the part of 'one, who, without a privilege to do so, intentionally causes severe emotional distress to another,' indicating that the requisite intention exists 'when the act is done for the purpose of causing the distress or with knowledge * * * that severe emotional distress is substantially certain to be produced by (such) conduct.' Comment (a), Sec. 46, supra. Abusive language is, of course, only one of the many means by which the tort could be committed.
However, even if we assume, without deciding, the legal propriety of that doctrine, a study of its factual applications shows that line of demarcation should be drawn between conduct likely to cause mere ...
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Kingston Square Tenants v. Tuskegee Gardens, 91-6029-CIV.
...a contract whereby simple negligence is involved." Kirksey v. Jernigan, 45 So.2d 188, 189 (Fla.1950); see also Slocum v. Food Fair Stores of Florida, 100 So.2d 396 (Fla.1958).8 An examination of the Plaintiffs' Complaint reveals that it is devoid of any allegations concerning a physical per......
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Lyons v. Zale Jewelry Co., 42382
...(1953), 259 Ala. 240, 66 So.2d 600; Harned v. E-Z Finance Co. (1953), 151 Tex. 641, 254 S.W.2d 81; and Slocum v. Food Fair Stores of Florida, Inc. (1958), Fla., 100 So.2d 396. In the Hammett case the facts alleged as a basis for recovery of damages for mental suffering were somewhat similar......
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King v. Eastern Airlines, Inc.
...intentional tort.3 Later Florida Supreme Court opinions support this interpretation of Kirksey. See e.g., Slocum v. Food Fair Stores of Florida, 100 So.2d 396 (Fla.1958). In Slocum, the Supreme Court of Florida stated that the Kirksey decision 'would apparently allow recovery for mental suf......
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Knierim v. Izzo
...because severe emotional distress or consequent bodily injury has resulted. The conduct in the recent case of Slocum v. Food Fair Stores of Florida, Inc., Fla., 100 So.2d 396, sharply contrasts with that involved in this case and illustrates the point. There a customer in defendant's store ......
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Intentional torts
...See Also 1. Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. v. McCarson, 467 So.2d 277 (Fla. 1985). 2. Slocum v. Food Fair Stores of Florida, Inc. , 100 So.2d 396, 397 (Fla. 1958). §10:10.1.1 Elements of Cause of Action — 1st DCA The elements of a cause of action for this tort are: 1. the wrongdoer’s condu......