Biederman's of Springfield, Inc. v. Wright

• Decision Date: 13 April 1959
• Docket Number: No. 2,No. 46709,46709,2
• Citation: 322 S.W.2d 892
• Parties: BIEDERMAN'S OF SPRINGFIELD, INC., a corporation, Respondent, v. Don C. WRIGHT and Daisy Wright, Appellants
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

Page 892

322 S.W.2d 892

BIEDERMAN'S OF SPRINGFIELD, INC., a corporation, Respondent, v. Don C. WRIGHT and Daisy Wright, Appellants.

No. 46709.

Supreme Court of Missouri, Division No. 2.

April 13, 1959.

James H. Keet, Springfield, for defendants-appellants.

Irving W. Schwab, Thomas D. Dwyer, Springfield, for respondent.

STORCKMAN, Presiding Judge.

Plaintiff sued the defendants, husband and wife, in the Magistrate Court of Greene County, alleging that the defendants had purchased merchandise from the plaintiff in the total amount of $686.83 and had paid $154, leaving a balance of $532.83, for which amount with interest judgment was prayed. The defendants' answer admitted the purchase of merchandise but alleged that $209 had been paid on the account. The defendants further admitted that the plaintiff demanded payment at numerous times and alleged their reasons for not paying the balance was because of the plaintiff's failure and refusal to give proper credit for payments made. Defendants further aver they were without information or belief as to whether the price charged for the merchandise was reasonable and just and prayed a determination of the amount due.

The defendants also filed separate counterclaims, each seeking the recovery of damages in the sum of $15,000, consisting of actual damages $5,000, and punitive damages $10,000, because of allegedly tortious conduct of the plaintiff in attempting to collect the account. Because the amount of the counterclaims exceeded the jurisdiction of the Magistrate Court, the cause was transferred to the Circuit Court. There the plaintiff filed its motion to dismiss the separate amended counterclaims on the ground that such pleadings failed to state claims upon which relief could be granted. The motion was sustained and the counterclaims were dismissed. The defendants appealed from the judgment of dismissal.

The sole question presented on appeal is whether the counterclaims state claims upon which relief can be granted. Since the pleadings are hardly susceptible of condensation, we will set out in extenso the mooted allegations. The counterclaim of defendant, Daisy Wright, alleges in the first two paragraphs that the defendants are husband and wife, and that the plaintiff has failed to give the defendants full credit for the payments made on the merchandise purchased. The counterclaim then proceeds:

'3. On May 17, 18 and 20, 1957, Robert Mashburn, acting in the course and scope of his employment by plaintiff as an 'Outside Collector', went to Mary's Cafe in Springfield, Missouri, where this defendant was then working as a waitress, and on the three said dates accosted this defendant with loud, overbearing, tough, degrading and embarrassing demands that she pay the said account and tried to get her to sign a post-dated check for payment on the said account. On the occasion he came to the cafe on May 17, 1957, he used language which was very threatening, including the words 'Your day's arrived' and 'You will talk to me' (said quoted words meaning that this defendant's time had come and something bad was going to happen to her and if she did not do something about the account, Mashburn would, by some means, fair or foul, make this defendant talk to him). As the said Mashburn was thus threatening this defendant on May 17, he was following her around in the cafe as she did her waitress work.

'4. On May 18, 1957, Mashburn again at said cafe threatened this defendant with the threat that he would stay all day on May 20 and would garnishee and get both defendants fired from their jobs and he again followed her around the cafe while she was doing her waitress work and again tried to get her to sign a post-dated check for payment of the account.

'5. On May 20, 1957, Mashburn said to this defendant at the cafe 'Something is going to be done here while I am here--I think you're dead beats--I don't think you intended to pay for the furniture when you got it'.

'6. On each of said three dates when the said Mashburn came to the cafe as aforesaid, he talked in a loud, threatening, quarreling and abusive manner and so that the customers in the cafe at the time could hear and would hear what he was saying to this defendant. On each of the three occasions, numerous customers were in the said cafe and heard and saw what occurred between said Mashburn and this defendant. On each of the three occasions, the management of the said cafe repeatedly asked Mashburn to leave the premises and stop bothering this defendant but Mashburn persisted in his conduct and would not leave the premises, thus committing a trespass on the said property on each of said occasions. This defendant on each of the three occasions told Mashburn she could not talk to him about the account while she was working and assured him she would discuss it with him at her home and then entreated him to leave, but he refused to do so and on each of the occasions remained for an unduly long time and continued to harass her.

'7. On each of the three occasions, numerous customers were in the said cafe and heard and saw what occurred between said Mashburn and defendant Daisy Wright. The following words thus spoken by the said Mashburn on May 20, 1957 ([sic] 'I think you're dead beats--I don't think you intended to pay for the furniture when you got it' were spoken of and concerning defendants and tended to and did subject defendants to the hatred, contempt and ridicule of the persons in the said cafe at the time the words were thus spoken within the hearing of such persons, and also to the hatred, contempt and ridicule of the entire community in which this defendant lives. The said words imputed, and the said persons in the cafe heard and understood that they imputed, that this defendant was dishonest and failed to keep her word and was guilty of a crime (obtaining property by false pretenses), which involved moral turpitude.

'8. Plaintiff, acting through its employee, Mashburn, should have realized, and did realize, that Mashburn's acts would be offensive to persons of ordinary sensibilities and to defendants, and that they dealt with details of defendants' private life which defendants did not want exposed to the public and would seriously object to publicizing unnecessarily. The said conduct was a serious, unreasonable, unwarranted, coercive and oppressive interference with defendants' private affairs. Defendant at no time consented to publication of the words thus spoken of them by Mashburn.

'9. The said acts of the said Mashburn put defendants into disgrace and ridicule in the eyes of the public; imputed dishonesty to them; had a natural tendency to degrade and disgrace them and render them odious, ridiculous and contemptible in the eyes of the public; imputed that defendants were unwilling to pay their just debts and failed to keep their word; were intended to produce mental pain, shock and anguish in defendants.

'10. The said Mashburn was in a strategic and peculiar position to harass defendants. The said acts of the said Mashburn were done and committed intentionally, wilfully, wantonly and maliciously and for the purpose of, and with the effect of, harassing and annoying defendants mentally and producing severe mental pain, shock and anguish in defendants and gave the general public information on a private matter (the status of the debt owed to plaintiff by defendants) in which the general public had, and could have, no legitimate interest. The said acts were not justified as efforts to collect the debt from defendants. They were coercive, opperessive, threatening and challenging and loud and were committed over the protests of, and without the consent of this defendant. They tended to, and were calculated to, and did, create a breach of the peace and were so offensive and provoking that it was necessary to, and the manager did, usher Mashburn outside the cafe on the third said occasion, which happened on March 20, 1957, as aforesaid, and on said occasion the police were summoned to the cafe because of Mashburn's conduct on that day. The said conduct of Mashburn so upset this defendant that she became extremely nervous and shaky and was unable to do her waitress work properly, which detracted from the reputation as a good waitress which she had previously enjoyed, and prejudiced her in her occupation as a waitress. It also caused special damage to her reputation and conduct of her waitress work since it reflected on her integrity, and her calling as a waitress required integrity. On each of the three occasions, the said Mashburn did distrub the peace of this defendant.

'11. As a result of the said Mashburn's conduct on the three said occasions, this defendant's husband, defendant Don Wright, was required by his employer, the Rose Exterminator Company of Springfield Missouri, to cease working in the Springfield, Missouri, area where he had previously worked for said company. The defendant Don Wright did quit working in the Springfield, Missouri, area for the said reason and has moved to Joplin, Missouri, and this defendant, Daisy Wright, has, because of this, had to move to Joplin, Missouri, with her husband, and leave her waitress work at Mary's Cafe.

'12. This defendant has, by said acts of said Mashburn been greatly injured in her good name, fame and reputation and brought into public reproach, disgrace, contempt, ridicule and hatred and caused to suffer great mortification, humiliation, embarrassement and shame, and caused to suffer lasting and permanent mental shock, injury, embarrassment and derangement and her right to be let alone and not have intimate details of her life exposed to the public have been violated.'

The counterclaim of defendant Don C. Wright adopts by reference the allegations contained in paragraphs 1 to 12, inclusive, of Mrs. Wright's counterclaim and makes these additional allegations:

'2. This defendant has, by the said acts of said Mashburn, been greatly injured in his...