Spencer v. Am. Airlines, Inc.

• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals
• Writing for the Court: ROBERT M. CLAYTON III, Judge
• Citation: Spencer v. Am. Airlines, Inc., 553 S.W.3d 861 (Mo. App. 2018)
• Decision Date: 29 June 2018
• Docket Number: No. ED 105809,ED 105809
• Parties: Karen D. SPENCER, Appellant, v. AMERICAN AIRLINES, INC., et al., Respondents.

553 S.W.3d 861

Karen D. SPENCER, Appellant,

v.AMERICAN AIRLINES, INC., et al., Respondents.

No. ED 105809

Missouri Court of Appeals, Eastern District, DIVISION THREE.

Filed: June 29, 2018

FOR APPELLANT: Kyle A. Kleefuss, 1708 Olive Street, St. Louis, MO 63103.

FOR RESPONDENT: Leo W. Nelsen, Atty. for Resp. American Airlines, Inc., 1010 Market St., Ste. 500, St. Louis, MO 63101, Graham J. Spence, Joshua J. Engelbart, Atty. for Resp. Jimmy Lee, 800 Market St., Ste. 2900, St. Louis, MO 63101.

ROBERT M. CLAYTON III, Judge

Karen D. Spencer ("Plaintiff") appeals the grant of summary judgment in favor of defendants American Airlines, Inc. (individually "AA") and Jimmy Lee (individually "Jimmy Lee" or "Lee") (collectively "Defendants") on Plaintiff’s negligence claims. We affirm in part and reverse and remand in part.

I. BACKGROUND

A. The Relevant Facts in the Summary Judgment Record

Viewing the record in the light most favorable to Plaintiff, the party against whom summary judgment was entered, the relevant facts are as follows.¹ On November 5, 2012, Plaintiff and her husband Larry Spencer ("Husband") were passengers on an AA flight departing from Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport ("the DFW airport") and arriving at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport ("the STL airport").

While waiting in the gate area of the DFW airport for the flight to St. Louis, Plaintiff and her Husband noticed two men, later identified as defendant Jimmy Lee and his companion, sitting approximately twenty feet away. According to Plaintiff’s and Husband’s collective deposition testimony, Lee and his companion were loudly talking and exhibiting body language indicating they were having an argument. Plaintiff could not hear what the two men were saying to each other, and they did not strike each other or get to a point where they were ready to strike each other. There is no evidence Lee and his companion were otherwise physical with one another, screaming, or using profanity. Nevertheless, Plaintiff testified the two men’s behavior in the gate area alarmed her and caused another family to change seats.

Before Plaintiff and her Husband boarded the flight, Lee and his companion boarded the flight separately. As Plaintiff and her Husband were boarding and getting to their assigned seats, they noticed Lee and his companion were seated in the row and seats directly in front of them, with Lee seated directly in front of Plaintiff.

According to portions of Plaintiff’s deposition testimony that were attached to both AA’s and Lee’s motions for summary judgment, the following then transpired. After the flight reached its cruising altitude and the captain turned off the fasten-seat belt sign, Lee exhibited body language intended to get his companion’s attention, but Lee’s companion ignored him. Lee unfastened his seatbelt, stood up, and put one knee on his seat. Lee then "got so angry [ ] his partner would not acknowledge him[ ] that he motioned forward, and then lunged back as hard as he could in the seat, which then crunched [Plaintiff’s] knee" and immediately caused Plaintiff to be in pain. Prior to her alleged injury, Plaintiff was sitting in her assigned seat with both feet flat on the floor, and her tray table was folded up. Because Plaintiff is very tall and has very long legs, her knees were sitting "pretty close" to Lee’s seatback before her alleged injury occurred. Plaintiff stated she could not be specific as to which part of Lee’s seat struck her knee because the incident happened so fast, but she stated something hit her knee and "crushed" it after Lee lunged forward and backwards in his seat.

In portions of Plaintiff’s Husband’s deposition testimony that were attached to both AA’s and Lee’s motions for summary judgment, Husband answered in the affirmative when he was asked if he saw Lee "recline[ ] his seat and the seat str[ike] [Plaintiff]." Later in his deposition testimony, Husband stated that while he probably did not actually see the seat strike Plaintiff’s knee, he saw Plaintiff grab her knee, saw Plaintiff wince, and saw the seat in front of her was reclined back.

Before Plaintiff’s alleged injury on the plane, neither Plaintiff nor her Husband attempted to report the behavior of Lee and his companion to a flight attendant. In addition, while there was a flight attendant somewhere in the gate area when Lee and his companion were arguing before they boarded a plane, there were no flight attendants in the area when part of Lee’s seat allegedly hit Plaintiff’s knee on the plane because the attendants were elsewhere in the aircraft getting ready to begin snack service.

After Plaintiff’s alleged injury, Plaintiff or her Husband pushed the call button for a flight attendant who arrived promptly. The flight attendant then tried to talk to Lee about the incident, but he ignored her. The attendant subsequently moved Plaintiff and her Husband to an exit row where Plaintiff could stretch her knee.

After the flight landed at the STL airport, another flight attendant called for a wheelchair and assisted Plaintiff off the aircraft. According to Plaintiff’s Husband’s deposition testimony, which is uncontroverted, the flight attendant did not do anything to aggravate Plaintiff’s alleged injury.

Lee’s seat was manufactured and installed in compliance with designs approved by the FAA, and the seat has a reclining mechanism. On the day of Plaintiff’s alleged injury, the seat was fully operable and had no mechanical defects. The seatback on the seat assigned to Lee is the only part of the seat that moves when the reclining mechanism is engaged by the passenger, and the top of the seatback reclines a maximum of two inches. The passenger seat itself does not move or slide forwards or backwards or move up or down when the reclining mechanism is engaged by the passenger. At the time Plaintiff claims to have been injured, defendant Jimmy Lee was permitted to recline his seat back because the aircraft was not taking off or landing.

Plaintiff testified she received four injections to rebuild the cartilage in her knee and had to undergo months of physical therapy as a result of the alleged injury she sustained on the plane. Plaintiff also testified she is not able to walk as fast as she used to and it is painful for her to stand for a long time.

B. The Relevant Procedural Posture

On February 3, 2015, Plaintiff filed a second amended petition asserting negligence claims against Defendants. With respect to defendant AA, Plaintiff claims in relevant part: AA "knew or through the use of ordinary care could have known of the danger presented by [ ] Lee to other passengers on account of his enraged mental state and prior and continuing quarreling"; AA "had a duty to use the highest degree of care to supervise passengers in order to prevent harm to others and/or to restrain, remove, or otherwise remediate passengers who present a danger of harm to others"; and as a direct and proximate result of AA’s acts or omissions, Plaintiff sustained injuries to her right knee and damages.

With respect to defendant Jimmy Lee, Plaintiff’s second amended petition alleges in relevant part: at the time of the incident, Lee "owed a duty of ordinary care to all those people, including Plaintiff, who could have foreseeably been injured by his actions"; "Lee breached his duty to Plaintiff and failed to exercise ordinary care while forcefully reclining his seat"; Lee was "negligent in reclining his seat in that he reclined [it] too fast, with too much force, without looking to observe the position of Plaintiff behind him, and without regard to the safety of Plaintiff"; and as a direct and proximate result of Lee’s actions, Plaintiff sustained injuries to her right knee and damages.

After AA and Lee each filed an answer to Plaintiff’s second amended petition, they each filed a motion for summary judgment and accompanying statement of material facts. AA’s motion for summary judgment argued that, inter alia , Plaintiff could not establish AA had a duty to protect Plaintiff from any alleged injury caused by Lee under the circumstances of this case.² Lee’s motion for summary judgment asserted Plaintiff could not establish, (1) Lee owed a duty to Plaintiff when reclining his airline seat; or (2) Lee’s airline seat was the cause-in-fact of Plaintiff’s alleged injury.³

In response, Plaintiff admitted almost all of the facts set forth in AA’s and Lee’s statements of material facts. Although Plaintiff did not file her own statement of material facts in response to either AA’s or Lee’s motion for summary judgment, she filed a memorandum in opposition to both motions. After Defendants each filed a reply motion, the trial court granted summary judgment in favor of both Defendants without setting forth any specific reasoning for its decision. This appeal followed.

II. DISCUSSION

Plaintiff raises two points on appeal. In Plaintiff’s second point on appeal, which we will consider first, she asserts the trial court erred in granting summary judgment in favor of AA. In Plaintiff’s first point on appeal, she claims the trial court erred in granting summary judgment in favor of Jimmy Lee.

A. The Standard of Review and General Law

Our Court’s review of a trial court’s decision granting summary judgment is de novo. B.B. v. Methodist Church of Shelbina, Missouri , 541 S.W.3d 644, 650 (Mo. App. E.D. 2017). Summary judgment is proper "where the moving party has demonstrated, on the basis of facts as to which there is no genuine dispute, a right to judgment as a matter of law."

Street v. Harris , 505 S.W.3d 414, 415 (Mo. App. E.D. 2016) (quoting ITT Commercial Finance Corp. v. Mid-America Marine Supply Corp. , 854 S.W.2d 371, 376 (Mo. banc 1993) ). A defendant may establish summary judgment is appropriate by showing, inter alia, (1) facts negating any one of the elements of the plaintiff’s cause of action; or (2) the plaintiff, after an adequate period of discovery, has not and will not be able to produce evidence sufficient for...