Dalzell v. Dean Hotel Co.

• Decision Date: 03 April 1916
• Citation: 186 S.W. 41,193 Mo.App. 379
• Parties: FLORENCE T. DALZELL, Appellant, v. DEAN HOTEL COMPANY, Respondent
• Court: Kansas Court of Appeals

186 S.W. 41

193 Mo.App. 379

FLORENCE T. DALZELL, Appellant, v. DEAN HOTEL COMPANY, Respondent

Court of Appeals of Missouri, Kansas City

April 3, 1916

Appeal from Jackson Circuit Court.--Hon. C. A. Burney, Judge.

REVERSED AND REMANDED.

Judgment reversed and cause remanded.

Park & Brown for appellant.

Cowherd Ingraham, Durham & Morse and Hale Houts for respondent.

OPINION

TRIMBLE, J.

--Defendant operates the Hotel Baltimore in Kansas City. Plaintiff, with her husband, was a guest and had a room in said hotel. During the temporary absence of her husband from the hotel, plaintiff was required by defendant's servants to vacate and give up the room. She brought this suit for damages, alleging that defendant unlawfully, wilfully and maliciously ejected her from said room causing her to suffer great pain, chagrin, humiliation mortification, disgrace, and anguish of both body and mind; that her nervous system was greatly shocked, by which she was rendered extremely nervous and sick, and suffered a miscarriage as a direct result thereof. Originally, her petition prayed for $ 25,000 actual and $ 25,000 punitive damages, but during the trial it was amended so as to ask for $ 2500 compensatory and $ 5000 exemplary damages.

The answer was a general denial.

In addition to the facts and circumstances relating to her being compelled to give up the room, plaintiff offered to prove that, at the time, she was in a state of pregnancy of about six weeks advancement; that up to the time of her eviction she had been in normal health; that immediately after leaving the room in the hotel her physical condition became highly nervous and excited; that she remained in that condition all that afternoon, felt sick and faint and medicine was given to relieve her; that she left Kansas City that night for her home in St. Louis arriving there the next morning; that her condition grew worse and her physician was called; that she continued in a very serious condition, suffering from nervous prostration, with symptoms of extreme nervousness, tremor and crying, eating nothing and with her temperature at ninety-nine and her pulse 110, and in a general state of emotional agitation; that seven days after her arrival home she suffered a miscarriage and was in a very serious condition for some time thereafter. Plaintiff offered to prove her condition, up to the time she left Kansas City, by herself and Mr. and Mrs. Dunn, friends living in Kansas City to whose house she went after leaving the hotel. Her condition after her arrival in St. Louis she offered to prove by herself and her doctor, a physician and surgeon of that city with fourteen years experience. Plaintiff also offered to prove by this physician and by two physicians of Kansas City, both of long experience, one now president of the Jackson county Medical Society and the other a former Secretary of the State Board of Health, that plaintiff's condition was one which could be produced by emotional shock, and that emotional shock will produce miscarriage with a woman in normal condition; that assuming the circumstances attending and following her eviction from the room to be true, which were embodied in hypothetical questions, the miscarriage might or could have been produced by and be the direct result of the mental and nervous shock received by the treatment accorded her.

All of the foregoing offers of testimony on the part of plaintiff were excluded by the trial court, except possibly plaintiff's statement, made at the outset, that up to the time of the trouble at the hotel she had been in good health. The court also refused plaintiff's instructions submitting the question of actual and punitive damages, and, at the request of defendant, instructed the jury that if they found for plaintiff they could allow her only nominal damages.

The jury returned a verdict for plaintiff in the sum of $ 5 and plaintiff has appealed.

The verdict shows that the jury accepted plaintiff's version of the affair at the hotel, and in view of this fact and the further fact that the trial court excluded the testimony offered as hereinabove stated, we must accept plaintiff's testimony as true and give to it the benefit of all the inferences which can be reasonably drawn therefrom. And a proper understanding of the case requires a statement of the facts somewhat in detail.

On Monday evening, October 16, 1911, Mr. and Mrs. Dalzell left St. Louis for Kansas City to attend a convention of the Knights of Pythias. They arrived in Kansas City on the morning of October 17th. They went to the Baltimore Hotel where Mr. Dalzell registered and they were accepted as guests about eleven o'clock in the day, and were assigned to room 367 and given the key thereto. They occupied that room the remainder of the day and night of October 17th.

The next morning plaintiff, feeling indisposed, did not arise. About ten o'clock in the morning her husband left the room to attend the convention. Upon his departure plaintiff arose, locked the door, leaving the key in the door on the inside and returned to her bed.

About twenty or thirty minutes later there was a knock at the door. Plaintiff asked what was wanted, and the person at the door asked her how soon she would vacate the room. Plaintiff replied: "Vacate the room? What is the trouble? I am not supposed to vacate this room. My husband left me here and I am in bed sick. I don't know anything about vacating the room--there must be a mistake."

Thereupon the person who had knocked left the door and plaintiff remained resting in bed. About fifteen or twenty minutes later, plaintiff was again awakened by a knock at the door and she was asked the same question, when she was going to vacate the room. She was also told that another had been assigned to the room and they wanted to know how soon she was going to get out of it. She again told them it was a mistake and that they should look into it. The person at the door replied they didn't know anything about that; that plaintiff was to give up the room, and wanted to know how soon she would give it up. Plaintiff testified that she couldn't recall all she said.

Plaintiff, thinking that perhaps she had better get up and get dressed as there was some trouble, arose from her bed and went into the bathroom to take her bath. While in the tub the telephone in her room rang. She got out of the tub and went to answer it. The person speaking over the telephone told her he was the clerk. He said the room had been checked out in the morning and was assigned to a gentleman who was waiting for it, and he wanted know how soon she would get out of the room. Plaintiff testified: "I told him where he could reach Mr. Dalzell. I told him I was Mrs. Dalzell and he could find Mr. Dalzell over at the convention hall, and I knew positively that he didn't pay for that room without notifying me. He said the room had been paid out and the party had left--he paid for the room and said that the party would be out in fifteen minutes and I had to get out. I said, 'Are you positive?' He said 'Yes, I know my business.' And hung up the receiver on me."

Plaintiff testified that she then tried to reach her husband over the telephone but could not find the number of the hall in the book; that she then tried to dress hurriedly to find her husband and to pack her clothes as she did not want to be thrown out of the room. Before she had finished dressing there was another rap at the door and plaintiff, being then dressed enough to go and open it, unlocked the door. Plaintiff then testified:

"I unlocked it, and there stood the boy with some baggage and a gentleman. I couldn't tell you how the boy was dressed, any more than as boys do--with cap with the number on it--I judged he was a bell boy--I know he was carrying a grip. He asked whether I was ready to vacate the room--I said yes I am through--I will be out in a few minutes, and the man says, 'I don't want the room until one o'clock, don't hurry.' I said I had nearly finished dressing, so I got my hat and coat and walked out. The boy came in and took my baggage and went down on the same elevator with me. He checked them and handed me the checks in the lobby. I went to a clerk standing in the hotel. I pounded (showing). 'I want to know why I was put out of the room.' He turned from me and said he knew nothing about it and walked away. I said, 'I will find somebody that does. ' I went out the door and walked as fast as I could to the Casino to find Mr. Dalzell, but in the meantime Mr. Dalzell had come back to the hotel. I hurried back to the hotel and just as I was coming in to this desk, the clerk said, Mr. Dalzell was then phoning, from the room I had vacated, to the clerk that had talked to me, that he had said he didn't know anything about it. The clerk said, 'Here is your wife now.' I took the telephone and said hello, and Mr. Dalzell came down stairs. There were quite a few people there, the convention being over, men came to the hotel. There were lots of people there. I was then very faint, dizzy, sick, exhausted and nervous. There was conversation between Mr. Dalzell and the employees. After that we went to the Coates House, where we ate. After lunch, I went out to my friend, Mrs. Dunn's, where I stayed until train time that evening, nine something, I believe when we took the train home. I felt sickly, had to lie down. Mrs. Dunn got some aspirin to quiet me. We arrived at St. Louis about eight o'clock the next morning. When I got home I felt very sick. I laid down and tried to rest. I was nervous and was up and down all that day, and the next day, and Wednesday I took down with a serious illness. On Thursday, called a physician, Dr. E. Morrish, who had been our family physician."

Here plaintiff was asked as to...