State ex rel. Dean v. Cunningham
| Citation | 182 S.W.3d 561 |
| Decision Date | 10 January 2006 |
| Docket Number | No. SC 86695.,SC 86695. |
| Parties | STATE ex rel. Laurie DEAN, Relator, v. The Honorable Jon A. CUNNINGHAM, Respondent. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Court of Missouri |
D. Eric Sowers, Ferne P. Wolf, St. Louis, for Relator.
Daniel K. O'Toole, Jeffrey T. McPherson, Cynthia A. Petracek, Armstong Teasdale, LLP, St. Louis, for Respondent.
Mary Anne Sedey, St. Louis, for Amicus Curiae.
INTRODUCTORY SUMMARY
Does the physician-patient privilege apply to an action seeking damages for emotional distress under the Missouri human rights act for alleged sex discrimination and sexual harassment, or does such an action always waive the privilege?
There are three sources of law that govern the issue:
1. An action for damages for sex discrimination and sexual harassment under the Act, section 213.010 et seq.1, allows recovery of actual and punitive damages.2 Recoverable actual damages may include awards for emotional distress. H.S. v. Board of Regents, Southeast Missouri State University, 967 S.W.2d 665, 673 (Mo.App.1998).
2. The physician-patient privilege in section 491.060(5) provides that various health care providers, including physicians and psychologists, are incompetent to testify concerning any information acquired while attending a patient in a professional capacity.
3. Cases under Missouri's discovery provisions hold that a patient who places his or her physical or mental condition in controversy by bringing a damages claim waives the privilege as to relevant information to which the defendant is entitled in maintaining a defense.
Laurie Dean brought an action for sex discrimination and sexual harassment against her employer and two individuals. To determine whether Dean has waived her privilege, the court examines her pleadings and responses to discovery. Under Missouri's fact pleading, Dean's petition is an outline of her factual contentions that sets the limits on what evidence is relevant at trial. Her discovery responses, which provide elaboration as to her factual contentions, likewise define the limits of relevant evidence at trial.
Dean contends that, though she seeks damages for emotional distress and humiliation, she does not seek recovery for any medically diagnosable injury. Rather, she contends that her emotional distress and humiliation are only what an ordinary person would experience in the circumstances. She refers to this as "garden variety" emotional distress, as distinct from medically documentable injury. In these circumstances, Dean claims, she has not placed her mental or physical condition in controversy and, thus, has not waived the physician-patient privilege.
The respondent trial judge rejected Dean's contentions and ordered her to produce discovery as to her mental health treatment records and to provide authorization for the defendants to obtain her mental health care records.
Dean petitioned the court of appeals for a writ of prohibition, which was denied. This Court issued its preliminary writ of prohibition, which is now made absolute, as modified.3 This Court has jurisdiction. Mo. Const. article V, section 4.
In summary, Dean may present evidence that shows that she was distressed or humiliated by the alleged discrimination, but, because she has not waived her physician-patient privilege, she may not present evidence of treatment for any alleged emotional distress to support her claim for damages. She is not barred from asking the finder of fact to award damages, under the Act, for emotional distress, humiliation, or loss of enjoyment of life so long as it is without reference to medical or psychological treatment and is no more than the kind of emotional distress or humiliation that an ordinary person would experience in such circumstances.
Laurie Dean filed her petition in the circuit court of St. Charles County against her employer, RARE Hospitality International Inc., and Mark Adams and James Knicos, individually, under the provisions of the Act. Dean alleged sex discrimination and sexual harassment during her employment at RARE. Dean pleaded damages for loss of income, and "emotional distress, humiliation, inconvenience, and loss of enjoyment of life."
RARE then propounded discovery requests to Dean, including interrogatories and requests for production of documents. RARE's Interrogatory 1 asked Dean if she claimed, as a result of the matters alleged in her petition, that she had been Dean replied "No" to this interrogatory.
Interrogatory 2 asked Dean to "Identify each item of damage you claim you sustained as a result of the conduct of defendant [RARE] as alleged in the Petition; and further state the dollar amount you are claiming for each item of damage; and the manner in which you have calculated the dollar amount of each such item of damages." Dean replied that she was claiming "Emotional Distress, Embarrassment, and Humiliation — Plaintiff is, at this time, seeking only `garden variety' emotional distress damages."
Interrogatory 12, to which Dean objected, asked Dean to (Emphasis added.) Dean's objection to Interrogatory 12 was based, in part, on the physician-patient privilege and the fact that the interrogatory was not limited in scope and time.
RARE's request for production of documents number 13 asked Dean to produce "All medical records, reports, charts or notations of any kind describing or indicating plaintiffs (sic) physical or mental condition prepared by any physician, therapist, or any other person having occasion to treat, examine or care for plaintiff as requested in Interrogatory Number 1, and additionally, plaintiff is requested to execute the medical records release attached hereto to enable defendant [RARE] to acquire such documents." Dean objected to the request, in part, by asserting the physician-patient privilege and that the request was not limited in time.
Additionally, Dean refused to execute the medical record release attached to request for production of documents number 13. The attached release authorized RARE's attorneys to "inspect and copy all office, medical and hospital records, reports and other medical documents" in the possession of the recipient "and relating to illnesses of or injuries, examinations, treatment or confinement of the patient." The authorization included "records of all examinations, treatments and tests, including in-patient, out-patient and emergency room, whether for diagnostic or prognostic purposes, consultation reports, correspondence, x-rays, nurses notes, bills, doctors notes, photographs, videotapes, MRIs, and CT scans, workers' compensation records, psychologists notes and mental health records." The authorization left a blank line after the "TO:" designation and was not, itself, limited to mental health care providers.
After Dean's objections to its discovery, RARE sought an order to compel discovery from the trial judge. The judge granted RARE's motion to compel and ordered Dean to "produce all of her mental health treatment records" and "execute authorizations for the production of those records," and to answer Interrogatory 12. The judge held that "[b]y pleading for emotional distress damages, [Dean] place[d] her mental and emotional condition at issue and, thus, ma[de] her mental health treatment history discoverable."
The Act protects important societal interests in prohibiting discrimination in employment, public accommodation, and other interests on the basis of sex, race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, age as it relates to employment, disability, or familial status as it relates to housing. Section 213.010(5). The Act provides for broad enforcement authority in the Missouri human rights commission and administrative remedies. In addition, to further this societal interest in eliminating discrimination the Act allows a claimant to seek damages for actual and punitive damages, court costs, and reasonable attorney fees.4 Section 213.111.2. A court may also grant appropriate injunctive relief. Id.
The Act, in allowing a claim for damages, shows legislative intent to include private claims for relief by aggrieved employees and others, to further the enforcement of the statute. To allow a wide-ranging and legally irrelevant inquiry into a claimant's medical and psychological history could work at cross-purposes to the Act by deterring legitimate claims.
The privilege statute, section 491.060(5), speaks in terms of competency to testify, but is construed as a privilege statute.5 It provides that licensed physicians, chiropractors, psychologists, and dentists are incompetent to testify "concerning any information which he or she may have acquired from any patient while attending the patient in a professional character, and which information was necessary to enable him or her to prescribe and provide treatment for such patient as a physician, chiropractor, psychologist or dentist." There is also a fiduciary duty of confidentiality owed by a treating physician to his or her patients not to disclose...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Overstreet v. Trw Commercial Steering Div.
...Ill.Dec. 797, 594 N.E.2d 1317, 1324-25 (1992); Alberts v. Devine, 395 Mass. 59, 479 N.E.2d 113, 118-20 (1985); State ex rel. Dean v. Cunningham, 182 S.W.3d 561, 566-68 (Mo.2006); Sorensen v. Barbuto, 177 P.3d 614, 617-18 (Utah 2008); Morris v. Consolidation Coal Co., 191 W.Va. 426, 446 S.E.......
-
Amburgy v. Express Scripts, Inc.
...does not allege that he suffers any medically diagnosed condition that resulted from defendant's negligent act. See State ex rel. Dean v. Cunningham, 182 S.W.3d 561, 568 (Mo. banc Because the Complaint fails to plead harm resulting in compensable damage to plaintiff, plaintiff's claim of ne......
-
United Fire & Cas. Co. v. Dennis Thompson, Wayne Rocket & Rose Concrete Prods., Inc.
...damages. Thus, the absence of any medical testimony is not dispositive of his emotional distress claim. State ex rel. Dean v. Cunningham, 182 S.W.3d 561, 568 (Mo.2006) (“courts have held ... that for intentional torts no medical testimony is needed to show mental or emotional distress”); Wi......
-
Desclos v. Southern New Hampshire Medical Center
...emotional or mental condition "at issue," e.g., Jackson v. Chubb Corp., 193 F.R.D. 216, 225 (D.N.J.2000); State ex rel. Dean v. Cunningham, 182 S.W.3d 561, 567 (Mo. 2006) (en banc), or by "injecting his or her mental condition into the case," e.g., Hoffman v. Brookfield Republic, Inc., 87 P......