Plaintiffs left the restaurant without dining. Plaintiffs argued that subsection 7 did not repeal subsection 1 and prior case law permitting an action for slander per se wherein damages are presumed. We review a trial court's decision on a motion for summary disposition de novo. The motion may be granted when, except with regard to the amount of damages, there is no genuine issue of material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. In reviewing the trial court's decision, we must consider the affidavits, pleadings, depositions, admissions, and documentary evidence filed in the action or submitted by the parties, and, giving the benefit of the doubt to the non-moving party, we must determine whether a genuine issue of material fact exists to warrant a trial.
Statutory interpretation is a question of law which is considered de novo on appeal.
The primary goal of judicial interpretation of statutes is to ascertain and give effect to the intent of the Legislature. The first step in that determination is to review the specific language of the statute. If the statute is unambiguous on its face, the Legislature is presumed to have intended the meaning it plainly expressed, and judicial interpretation is neither required nor permissible. However, the language of a statute should be read in light of previously established rules of the common law. Well-settled common law principles are not to be abolished by implication, and when an ambiguous statute contravenes common law, it must be interpreted so that it makes the least change in the common law.