342 N.W.2d 492 (Iowa 1984), 69198, Oberreuter v. Orion Industries, Inc.

• Docket Nº: 69198.
• Citation: 342 N.W.2d 492
• Party Name: Richard OBERREUTER, Plaintiff, Violet Oberreuter, Plaintiff-Appellant, Thomas Oberreuter and Todd Oberreuter, Plaintiffs, v. ORION INDUSTRIES, INC., d/b/a Antenna Specialists Co., Defendant, Mid-State Distributing Company, Defendant-Appellee, Business Radio Sales & Service, Inc., and Benton County Electric Cooperative Association, Defendants.
• Case Date: January 18, 1984
• Court: Supreme Court of Iowa

Page 492

342 N.W.2d 492 (Iowa 1984)

Richard OBERREUTER, Plaintiff,

Violet Oberreuter, Plaintiff-Appellant,

Thomas Oberreuter and Todd Oberreuter, Plaintiffs,

v.

ORION INDUSTRIES, INC., d/b/a Antenna Specialists Co., Defendant,

Mid-State Distributing Company, Defendant-Appellee,

Business Radio Sales & Service, Inc., and Benton County Electric Cooperative Association, Defendants.

No. 69198.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

January 18, 1984

William Sidney Smith, Gary A. Robinson, William B. Serangeli, and Robert A. Royal of Smith, Schneider & Stiles, P.C., Des Moines, for plaintiff-appellant.

John A. McClintock and Richard G. Blane II of Hansen, McClintock & Riley, Des Moines, for defendant-appellee.

Considered by REYNOLDSON, C.J., and UHLENHOPP, HARRIS, McCORMICK and WOLLE, JJ.

Page 493

REYNOLDSON, Chief Justice.

In this interlocutory appeal from a ruling sustaining a motion to dismiss, plaintiff Violet Oberreuter asks us to expand our holding in Barnhill v. Davis, 300 N.W.2d 104 (Iowa 1981), and recognize her claim for negligent infliction of emotional distress arising out of injuries to her husband and son, even though she was neither a witness nor a bystander to the injury-causing incident. We deny her request and affirm trial court's ruling striking from her petition allegations based on this cause of action.

This case was brought by a father and son burned when a citizens band antenna they were handling came near to or in contact with an electrical transmission line; a son who was a bystander; and this plaintiff wife and mother (hereafter referred to as sole plaintiff) who asserts claims based on loss of consortium and the claims at issue here. Various counts alleged negligence, breach of warranty and strict liability against several defendants.

Defendant Mid-State Distributing Company moved under Iowa Rule of Civil Procedure 104(b) to dismiss plaintiff's claims based on negligent infliction of emotional distress. Plaintiff argued she was a reasonably foreseeable and direct victim of defendants' allegedly negligent acts, to whom defendants owed a duty of care, despite the fact that she was neither a witness nor a bystander when her husband and son sustained injuries. Defendant Mid-State contended plaintiff's failure to meet the elements specified for recovery in Barnhill, 300 N.W.2d at 108, precluded plaintiff's emotional distress claims. Trial court sustained the motion, leaving plaintiff with her claims for loss of consortium. In this appeal plaintiff and Mid-State advance...