Opinion ID: 1153244
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: is there a wrongful death cause of action?

Text: Mr. and Mrs. Sweeney had to be acutely aware beginning in 1974 that she had serious problems giving birth to a healthy child. On July 25, 1974, she delivered a stillborn baby, and on March 21, 1976, she had a spontaneous abortion. Dr. Preston's alleged act of negligence occurred in July 1974 added to a disorder she already had. In April 1977 Mr. and Mrs. Sweeney were advised by another physician, Dr. Copeland, of Dr. Preston's negligence and the problem it created. In 1980 still another physician, Dr. Burrus, told her the serious risk and danger of having any more children, and advised sterilization. The Sweeneys ignored his advice. They chose for her to become pregnant, and as a result on June 26, 1984, she delivered a child who lived two days. Despite this tragedy, they again chose for her to become pregnant, and on April 15, 1986, while under the care of still another physician, Dr. Dacus, she delivered a child who lived two days. On March 24, 1987, thirteen years after the negligent act of Dr. Preston, and ten years after the Sweeneys were notified of it, they sued Dr. Preston for malpractice. Dr. Preston's negligent act, if it occurred, was a single act. After he and the Sweeneys learned of it, there was nothing further Dr. Preston could do except warn. Warning they had. He could not prevent further harm, further injury. That decision was solely for the Sweeneys. They chose the most terrible danger of all, bringing into a life a human being who had little chance of living, and if so, could go through whatever life it had deformed and maimed. That decision was peculiarly one which only the Sweeneys could make, and Dr. Preston should not be held accountable for its consequences. There can be no doubt that uppermost in the minds of any couple who want to have a child is the desire that it be born healthy. When informed of the hazard in their particular case, the heartache, misery and pain in bringing into life a child who shortly dies, or is doomed to deformity or catastrophic disability, it was the Sweeneys, and they alone, to make the choice of whether to conceive or not, one which they and they alone should make, and for which they and they alone should be responsible. The majority not only holds Dr. Preston responsible for these two tragic deaths, but tells the Sweeneys they will have a cause of action for every child the Sweeneys attempt in the future who dies shortly after birth, or who is born maimed and deformed. Instead of worrying about his patients when he lies down to sleep at night, Dr. Preston can look forward to the very good chance of being a court defendant the remainder of his life. With this burden it will take a very soft pillow to give him much sleep. It would be far better if physicians in small towns could spend their time worrying about their patients than lawsuits such as the majority today authorizes. Dr. Preston could not prevent Mrs. Sweeney from becoming pregnant. Only she could make that decision. In centuries of struggle to safeguard a free, independent and civilized society, courts have erected and adhered to two basic concepts, personal accountability and personal responsibility. Puckett v. Rufenacht, Bromagen & Hertz, 587 So.2d 273, 278 (Miss. 1991). The law has always set boundaries beyond which personal accountability will not extend. Borer v. American Airlines, Inc. 19 Cal.3d 441, 446-47, 138 Cal. Rptr. 302, 563 P.2d 858 (1979). Even a person who commits a criminal act, once he has paid his debt to society, is punished no further in court. The law has also always recognized that rational people with full knowledge of the hazards entailed who choose to engage in dangerous undertaking must assume personal responsibility therefor. The majority and all the authorities it cites ignore these basics. Dr. Preston's accountability is unlimited, the Sweeneys assume no personal responsibility. Volenti non fit injuria, he who consents cannot receive an injury, 65A C.J.S. Negligence § 174(2), is ignored by the majority. The evidence before the circuit court in granting summary judgment was that the Sweeneys deliberately chose for Mrs. Sweeney to become pregnant, it was not an accident. Dr. Preston's negligence, at most, contributed to a certain physical condition in Mrs. Sweeney further impairing her ability to bear a healthy child. It took a deliberate choice followed by a deliberate action by the Sweeneys, however, to produce the harm in this case. If this did not constitute an independent intervening cause, one cannot be envisioned. In City Lines v. Bullock, 194 Miss. 630, 639-40, 13 So.2d 34, 36, 145 A.L.R. 119 (1943), this Court held: Although one may be negligent, yet if another, acting independently and voluntarily, puts in motion another and intervening cause which efficiently thence leads in unbroken sequence to the injury, the latter is the proximate cause and the original negligence is relegated to the position of a remote and, therefore, a nonactionable cause. Negligence which merely furnished the condition or occasion upon which injuries are received but does not put in motion the agency by or through which the injuries are inflicted, is not the proximate cause thereof. The question is, did the facts constitute a succession of events so linked together as to make a natural whole, or was there some new and independent cause intervening between the alleged wrong and the injury? 38 Am.Jur., p. 702; Thompson v. Mississippi Cent. R. Co., 175 Miss. 547, 554, 166 So. 353. And so say all the authorities, among which, as a striking illustration, is Bufkin v. Louisville & N.R. Co., 161 Miss. 594, 137 So. 517. (Emphasis added) This principle was followed in Hoke v. W.L. Holcombe & Assoc., Inc., 186 So.2d 474 (Miss. 1966); Saucier v. Walker, 203 So.2d 299 (Miss. 1967); Stewart v. Kroger Grocery, 198 Miss. 371, 21 So.2d 912 (1945); E.I. DuPont de Nemours & Co. v. Ladner, 221 Miss. 378, 73 So.2d 249 (1954); Permenter v. Milner Chevrolet Co., 229 Miss. 385, 91 So.2d 243 (1956). Nor is M & M Pipe & Pres. Vessel Fab. v. Roberts, 531 So.2d 615 (1988), contrary to this holding. In that case the negligence of the pipe company's driver on the highway was immediately followed by negligence of a car following in reaction to the first act of negligence, and which could have been reasonably anticipated by the former. The children born in this case resulted solely from the deliberate choice of Mr. and Mrs. Sweeney for her to become pregnant after clear warning from her physician of the danger this entailed. E.I. DuPont de Nemours & Co. v. Ladner, supra . There is an invidious treatment by the majority of the medical profession as opposed to any other. Suppose a lawyer gave an erroneous certificate of title, which is caught before injury, and the recipient warned not to act on it. Then, disregarding the warning, a parent invests his child's money in property with a defective title. Would we hold the erring lawyer liable? Suppose an architect draws defective plans discovered before any building is erected. Then, after being fully warned the plans are defective and should not be followed  indeed dangerous to follow  the warning is totally disregarded by an owner who builds according to the defective plans. Would we hold the architect liable if a subsequently born child of the owner was injured or killed because of the collapse of the building? See also Touche Ross v. Commercial Union Ins., 514 So.2d 315 (Miss. 1987) (applying doctrine of independent intervening case to accountants). In facts more favorable to plaintiffs than the instant case, in other jurisdictions where a subsequently conceived child has sought to bring an action for injuries to or negligent treatment of his mother prior to his conception, the courts have declined to impose liability upon the tort feasor, the treating physician or medical facility. Hegyes v. Unjian Enterprises, Inc., 286 Cal. Rptr. 85, 234 Cal. App.3rd 1103 (1992); Albala v. City of New York, 54 N.Y.2d 269, 445 N.Y.S.2d 108, 429 N.E.2d 786 (1981); Enright v. Eli Lilly & Co., 77 N.Y.2d 377, 568 N.Y.S.2d 550, 570 N.E.2d 198 (1991); McAuley v. Wills, 251 Ga. 3, 303 S.E.2d 258 (1983). Clearly here, where the Sweeneys were warned of the danger of having children, Dr. Preston should not be held accountable for the result.