Opinion ID: 1385913
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Foreseeability and certainty of injury in funeral-related services โ mortuary and crematory defendants.

Text: The mortuary and crematory defendants do not dispute the foreseeability that mishandling human remains in the manner alleged in the model complaint is likely to cause serious emotional distress to members of the decedent's immediate family regardless of whether they observe the actual negligent conduct or injury to the remains of their decedent. Even in the context of an action for breach of contract, where recovery of damages solely for emotional distress resulting from a breach is not normally allowed, the provision of services related to the disposition of human remains has been distinguished because of the unique nature of the services. This court so held in Chelini v. Nieri (1948) 32 Cal.2d 480 [196 P.2d 915], where defendant mortician breached a contract to preserve the body of the plaintiff's mother. The court held that recovery for emotional distress, there accompanied by symptoms of physical illness, was permitted in that context because the contract was directly related to the comfort, happiness, or personal welfare of the plaintiff. More recently, in Allen v. Jones (1980) 104 Cal. App.3d 207, 211 [163 Cal. Rptr. 445], e.g., the defendant operators of a mortuary contracted to ship the remains of plaintiff's decedent brother to another state. The remains were lost in transit. The Court of Appeal held that the contract was one which so affected the vital concerns of an individual that recovery for emotional distress was permitted, explaining: A contract whereby a mortician agrees to prepare a body for burial is one in which it is reasonably foreseeable that breach may cause mental anguish to the decedent's bereaved relations. `One who prepares a human body for burial and conducts a funeral usually deals with the living in their most difficult and delicate moments.... The exhibition of callousness or indifference, the offer of insult and indignity, can, of course, inflict no injury on the dead, but they can visit agony akin to torture on the living. So true is this that the chief asset of a mortician and the most conspicuous element of his advertisement is his consideration for the afflicted. A decent respect for their feelings is implied in every contract for his services.' ( Fitzsimmons v. Olinger Mortuary Ass'n. (1932) 91 Colo. 544 [17 P.2d 535, 536-537].) In a similar vein, another court has stated: The tenderest feelings of the human heart center around the remains of the dead. When the defendants contracted with plaintiff to inter the body of her deceased husband in a workmanlike manner they did so with the knowledge that she was the widow and would naturally and probably suffer mental anguish if they failed to fulfill their contractual obligation in the manner here charged.... . ( Lamm v. Shingleton (1949) 231 N.C. 10 [55 S.E.2d 810, 813-814]; Allen v. Jones, supra, 104 Cal. App.3d 207, 211-212.) (9) In all of the reported cases called to our attention, however, the relatives who were permitted to recover for negligence in the conduct of funeral and/or related services were aware that the services were being performed, and were persons for whose benefit the defendants had undertaken to provide the services. Recognition that it is foreseeable that close relatives of the deceased may suffer severe emotional distress as a result of negligence in the manner in which the corpse of their decedent is handled was in that context. Plaintiffs identify no case in which persons who were not contemporaneously aware of both the death of their close relative and the nature of the funeral-related services that were to be performed have been held to be foreseeable victims of negligence in the conduct of those services. We agree, therefore, with defendants' observation that the potential plaintiffs who could seek damages under the decision of the Court of Appeal is not appropriately limited. Under that court's decision persons who were infants or even unborn at the time the funeral-related services were performed, and others who were unaware of either the death or the nature of the services performed, could sue long after the services were completed on learning of an impropriety in the disposition of the remains. It would be unreasonable to consider those persons to be among the close relatives for whom the funeral-related services were performed, and to impose liability to them upon defendants. They are not persons for whose benefit the defendants undertook to perform services and thus no duty was owed to them. They are not foreseeable victims of the misconduct alleged in the model complaint. It is foreseeable, however, that close relatives who are aware that funeral-related services are to be undertaken, but who are unable to or do not want to observe the manner in which remains are prepared for burial or cremation, and thus do not observe the mistreatment of their decedent's remains, may suffer serious emotional distress on learning that the decedent's remains have been mistreated.