Hurt v. Rolling Frito-Lay Sales, L.P.

• Decision Date: 14 February 2023
• Docket Number: 1:22 CV 59 ACL
• Parties: MICHAEL C. HURT, Plaintiff, v. ROLLING FRITO-LAY SALES, L.P., Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Missouri

MICHAEL C. HURT, Plaintiff,
v.
ROLLING FRITO-LAY SALES, L.P., Defendant.

No. 1:22 CV 59 ACL

United States District Court, E.D. Missouri, Southeastern Division

February 14, 2023

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

ABBIE CRITES-LEONI, UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE

Plaintiff's decedent, Michael S. Hurt (“Decedent”), suffered a fatal cardiac event while working for Defendant. Plaintiff, Decedent's son, brought the instant Missouri wrongful death action against Defendant. Presently pending is Defendant's Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings. (Doc. 17.) The Motion is fully briefed and ready for disposition.

I. Background

In his Complaint, originally filed in the Circuit Court of Stoddard County, Missouri, Plaintiff alleges that Decedent was employed by Defendant to deliver and stock chips to various stores. He was required to wear a uniform, and work in an unusually hot work environment, under strict delivery deadlines, “which exposed him to high levels of stress triggering a cardiac event.” (Doc. 5 at 2.) Decedent's normal delivery route was extremely challenging and demanding such that after Decedent passed away, his previous route was split between two drivers. His working conditions caused extreme stress on his body, which caused or contributed to cause the cardiac event leading to his death.

Plaintiff alleges that Defendant knew or should have known that Decedent's job duties overworked Decedent, placing an extraordinary amount of stress on his body causing his death.

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Plaintiff contends that the following actions of Defendant were careless and negligent: failed to monitor its working conditions, failed to provide Decedent with assistance for workload, failed to provide and allow for adequate breaks to Decedent, failed to monitor Decedent's health and fitness for duty, failed to provide safe working environment to Decedent, negligently required an unmanageable workload for Decedent, and imposed unrealistic workload levels and pressure. As a direct and proximate result of Defendant's negligence, Decedent sustained physical injury and pain prior to his death, for which Plaintiff is entitled to recover monetary damages.

The Complaint alleges that Plaintiff's claim falls outside the exclusivity provision of the Missouri Workers' Compensation Act, because the Act does not provide a remedy under the facts of this case.

II. Legal Standard

“A motion for judgment on the pleadings should be granted when, accepting all facts pled by the nonmoving party as true and drawing all reasonable inferences from the facts in favor of the nonmoving party, the movant has clearly established that no material issue of fact remains and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Schnuck Mkts., Inc. v. First Data Merch. Servs. Corp., 852 F.3d 732, 737 (8th Cir. 2017) (cited case omitted).

A motion under Rule 12(c) is determined by the same standards that are applied to a motion under Rule 12(b)(6). Ellis v. City of Minneapolis, 860 F.3d 1106, 1109 (8th Cir. 2017). To survive a motion to dismiss pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted, “a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570). A plaintiff “must include sufficient factual information to provide the ‘grounds' on which the claim rests, and to raise a right to relief above a speculative

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level.” Schaaf, 517 F.3d at 549 (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555, 597 n.3). This obligation requires a plaintiff to plead “more than labels and conclusions, and a formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause of action will not do.” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555.

The Court accepts as true all of the factual allegations contained in the Complaint, even if it appears that “actual proof of those facts is improbable,” and reviews the complaint to determine whether its allegations show that the pleader is entitled to relief. Id. at 555-56; Fed.R.Civ.P. 8(a)(2). The principle that a court must accept as...