K Mart Corp. v. Adamson
| Decision Date | 05 September 1989 |
| Docket Number | No. A89A1431,A89A1431 |
| Citation | 192 Ga.App. 884,386 S.E.2d 680 |
| Parties | K MART CORPORATION v. ADAMSON. |
| Court | Georgia Court of Appeals |
Whitmer & Law, James H. Whitmer, G. Hammond Law III, J. Douglas Parks, for appellee.
The appellee, Michele Adamson, brought this action against the appellant, K Mart Corporation, to recover damages for false arrest and/or false imprisonment resulting from her detention for suspected shoplifting in a K Mart department store. The case is before us on interlocutory appeal from the denial of K Mart's motion for summary judgment.
Ms. Adamson entered the store with her young daughter for the purpose of having the child's picture taken by a store photographer. She brought with her a new dress for the child to wear, still on its original store hanger and still bearing the original store tags. While waiting for the customers ahead of her to be served by the photographer, the appellee took the child to the shoe department and clothed her in the new dress, removing the store tags from it and placing them in her pocketbook as she did so. She and her daughter then returned to the photographer, completed their mission and exited the store. As they did so, they were confronted by a K Mart security officer who had observed their actions in the shoe department. At his request, Ms. Adamson accompanied the officer to a back room, where he questioned her about the dress. There is some dispute about how long this detention lasted and whether Ms. Adamson and her daughter were subjected to any indignities during the course of it. However, it is undisputed that, after discussing the matter with other K Mart employees and determining that the dress could not have come from the store because K Mart did not sell that brand, the security officer ultimately apologized to Ms. Adamson and allowed her to leave.
Relying on this court's recent decision in K Mart Corp. v. Griffin, 189 Ga.App. 225, 375 S.E.2d 257 (1988), K Mart asserts that it had reasonable justification as a matter of law for suspecting Ms. Adamson of shoplifting and that it is consequently insulated from liability by OCGA § 51-7-60, which reads as follows: "Whenever the owner or operator of a mercantile establishment or any agent or employee of the owner or operator detains, arrests, or causes to be detained or arrested any person reasonably thought to be engaged in shoplifting and, as a result of the detention or arrest, the person so detained or arrested brings an action for false arrest or false imprisonment against the owner, operator, agent, or employee, no recovery shall be had by the plaintiff in such action where it is established by competent evidence: (1) That the plaintiff had so conducted himself or behaved in such manner as to cause a man of reasonable prudence to believe that the plaintiff, at or immediately prior to the time of the detention or arrest, was committing the offense of shoplifting, as defined by Code Section 16-8-14; or (2) That the manner of the detention or arrest and the length of time during which such plaintiff was detained was under all the circumstances reasonable." (Emphasis supplied.) Ms. Adamson, on the other...
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Carnegay v. Walmart Stores, Inc.
...the statute uses the disjunctive "or," we have held that the statute must be read in the conjunctive. K Mart Corp. v. Adamson , 192 Ga. App. 884, 886, 386 S.E.2d 680 (1989). Thus, to be entitled to summary judgment, Walmart must show both that it had a reasonable belief that Carnegay was sh......
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K-Mart Corp. v. Coker
...elected not to produce any evidence. As Judge Banke stated in another case involving the same defendant, K-Mart v. Adamson, 192 Ga.App. 884, 886, 386 S.E.2d 680 (1989): One who has done nothing to give the impression that he or she is shoplifting should not be subject to any detention at al......
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Rite-Aid Corp. v. Davis, No. A06A0682.
...84 Ga. 345, 10 S.E.2d 967 (1890); Vito v. Dhillon, 269 Ga.App. 899, 901-902(1)(a), 605 S.E.2d 602 (2004); K Mart Corp. v. Adamson, 192 Ga. App. 884, 886, 386 S.E.2d 680 (1989). I believe that the present case likewise requires us to interpret "or" in the conjunctive, since applying the lite......
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Jackson v. Kmart Corp., Civ. A. No. 92-437-4-MAC (WDO).
...the plaintiff was shoplifting, or (2) that the manner and length of the detention were reasonable.4 However, in K Mart Corp. v. Adamson, 192 Ga.App. 884, 386 S.E.2d 680 (1989), the Georgia Court of Appeals held that "the provisions ... codified as OCGA § 51-7-60(1) & (2) are to be read in t......