Thompson v. Estate of Petroff, 81-848.
| Decision Date | 21 May 1982 |
| Docket Number | No. 81-848.,81-848. |
| Citation | 319 NW 2d 400 |
| Parties | Luella Elizabeth THOMPSON, Appellant, v. The ESTATE OF Raymond Paul PETROFF and Marlene Campbell, authorized representative, Respondents. |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Allan Swen Anderson, Granite Falls, for appellant.
Joseph Kaminsky, Douglas Peine, Minneapolis, for respondents.
Heard, considered, and decided by the court en banc.
This is an appeal by Luella Elizabeth Thompson from an order of the District Court for the Eighth Judicial District, Yellow Medicine County, granting a motion for summary judgment made by respondents, the estate of Raymond Paul Petroff, and its personal representative.
Luella Thompson, who had been a widow since 1974, was 60 years old at the time of the incident giving rise to this action. In 1976 she began seeing the decedent, age 43, on a regular basis; their relationship continued until November of 1977. Thereafter they had no significant contacts with each other until November 16, 1979.
On that date, Petroff went to Thompson's house, entered without knocking, and told Thompson that he "wanted to talk." After he and Thompson had watched television together for several hours, he told her that he wished to resume their relationship. Thompson refused to do so, and acknowledged the truth of a rumor that she was planning to travel to the Middle East and marry an "Arab gentleman." Petroff became angry and refused to leave Thompson's house and to allow her to leave. He tried to force her to have oral sex with him but was unsuccessful. Thompson grabbed a kitchen knife with which to defend herself, but Petroff was able to corner her in the bedroom, where he cut her with the knife, raped her, and twice threatened to kill her. Immediately following the rape, Thompson managed to get ahold of a revolver that she had loaded and placed under the bed several months earlier. She pointed the gun at Petroff and told him to get out of the house. Petroff lunged toward the gun, striking it with his hand. The gun discharged, killing him.
Thompson was arrested and charged with murder in the third degree and second-degree manslaughter, and was tried on July 8-16, 1980, before the court, sitting without a jury. She was acquitted of all charges, the court finding that she acted in self-defense. Following her acquittal, she brought this action against Petroff's estate for compensatory and punitive damages. The estate moved for, and was granted, summary judgment on the ground that under Minn. Stat. § 573.01 (1980) an intentional tort action does not survive the death of the tortfeasor. Thompson appealed, contending that the survival statute violates the equal protection provisions of the state and federal constitutions.
1. Survival statutes rarely have been the subject of constitutional challenges,1 and in only one other state, Pennsylvania, has a survival statute been declared unconstitutional because a particular cause of action had been excluded.2 Moyer v. Phillips, 462 Pa. 395, 341 A.2d 441 (1975). The Minnesota survival statute, Minn.Stat. § 573.01 (1980), provides:
A cause of action arising out of an injury to the person dies with the person of the party in whose favor it exists, except as provided in section 573.02. It also dies with the person against whom it exists, except a cause of action arising out of bodily injuries or death caused by the negligence of a decedent or based upon strict liability, statutory liability or breach of warranty of a decedent, survives against his personal representatives. All other causes of action by one against another, whether arising on contract or not, survive to the personal representatives of the former and against those of the latter.
Id. (emphasis added). The statute precludes the victim of any personal injury other than those specified from bringing an action against the estate of a deceased tortfeasor. Thompson contends that the exclusion of intentional torts from the survival statute operates as an unconstitutional denial of equal protection. She argues that no rational basis exists for legislatively distinguishing between persons whose cause of action is based upon an unintentional injury and one whose action arises from an intentional tort.
At common law all causes of action died with the actors. See W. Prosser, Handbook of the Law of Torts 898 (4th ed. 1971). Although the origin of the rule actio personalis moritur cum persona is uncertain, it appears that it was originally based upon the fact that those acts now classified as torts were at one time dealt with as crimes. See id. At early common law no cause of action in tort in the modern sense existed.3 By the 13th century, a wrongdoer was dealt with by means of the appeal of felony. At that time, a felony was a crime that could be prosecuted by an accusation in which the accuser was required to offer battle. The felon was likely to forfeit life or limb and his lands and goods would be confiscated by the king. 2 F. Pollock & F. Maitland, The History of English Law 466 (2d ed. 1898). No clear distinction was made, at least with respect to the punishment visited upon the wrongdoer, between civil and criminal actions. Because these early actions were intended more to punish the wrongdoer than to compensate the victim, the rule evolved that no one other than the wrongdoer should suffer for his misdeeds. This rule apparently was well established by the middle of the 13th century, when Bracton wrote:
In obligations arising from delicta or maleficia, where the delinquent is bound to him against whom he has offended, the obligation is not extinguished with regard to the penalty except by the death of both or the other of the two parties. Punishment is not to be extended beyond the person of the offender, for he who is not at fault ought not to suffer punishment.
2 Bracton on the Laws and Customs of England 290 (S. Thorne trans. 1968).
According to some authorities, the appeal of felony eventually evolved into the writs of trespass.4 See 2 F. Pollock & F. Maitland, supra, at 511-12, 526; W. Prosser, supra, at 898. Whatever its origin, it is apparent that trespass retained a strong quasi-criminal character.5 In the earlier trespass cases, compensatory damages in the modern sense were almost unknown; the defendant usually would be required to pay an amount fixed by law rather than compensation for the plaintiff's actual injuries. See 2 F. Pollock & F. Maitland, supra, at 522-23. The nature of the trespass actions remained essentially punitive even as courts began to award actual damages, and the rule prohibiting the survival of such causes of action was retained. See Winfield, Death as Affecting Liability in Tort, 29 Colum.L.Rev. 239, 242 (1929). It was modified by statute during the reign of Edward III to permit causes of action for the loss, damage or conversion of personal property to survive the death of the plaintiff. See 4 Edw. 3 ch. 7 (1330); 25 Edw. 3, st. 5, ch. 5 (1351). Courts continued to hold, however, that "where the hurt or damage is corporal, as if a man beat me and die, my action is gone, or if I die my executors shall not have an action, for the party cannot be punished when he is dead." Y. B. Mich. 12 Hen. 8, f. 11, pl. 3 (1521); see Winfield, supra, at 245.
American courts, following the English rule as it existed in the 14th century, did not recognize the survival of actions for torts against real property, torts affecting the person, whether the injury was negligently or intentionally inflicted, or those involving injuries to interests of personality, such as defamation and malicious prosecution. See W. Prosser, supra, at 899-900. To alleviate the rule's often harsh results, state legislatures began in the 19th century to enact statutes that created a variety of exceptions to the rule.6 See id. at 900-01.
The history of the Minnesota survival statute is set forth in Lavalle v. Kaupp, 240 Minn. 360, 61 N.W.2d 228 (1953), in which we held that the version of the statute then in effect permitted only causes of action based on negligence to survive the death of the defendant. We outlined the statute's background as follows:
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