Opinion ID: 220369
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Paula's Damages

Text: Dillard's contends that the district court erred in calculating Paula's damages because Paula's right shoulder was already damaged when the Dillard's incident occurred. According to Dillard's, the clothing rack caused no further harm for which Dillard's is responsible. Alternatively, Dillard's maintains that even if a portion of Paula's current shoulder injuries are attributable to the Dillard's incident, Dillard's is liable only for that portion of the total damages that were directly caused by the Dillard's incident, as opposed to preexisting injuries. Further, Dillard's believes that it was Paula's burden to demonstrate what proportion of her current injuries are attributable to the Dillard's incident, and that because she has not met that burden, her recovery is limited to nominal damages. The district court rejected the theory that Paula's current shoulder problems are attributable to injuries that predated the Dillard's incident. According to Dr. Swaim and the district court, the Dillard's incident caused shoulder joint and muscle problems, which constituted a new injury. The district court credited Dr. Swaim's opinion that the 2002 accident caused nerve problems rather than structural damage to the shoulder muscles. Additionally, the district court rejected the hypothesis that Paula's long-term care-giving activities contributed to her current shoulder problems. With respect to the 1990 accident, the district court found that, although Paula sustained a shoulder injury in 1990, it healed and caused no further problems for more than a decade before the Dillard's incident. At most, according to the district court, Paula was left with a predisposition toward the kind of serious injury that resulted from the Dillard's incident. Thus, the district court found that Paula's shoulder muscle problems began in November 2004 and constituted a new injury wholly caused by the Dillard's incident. The district court concluded that [e]ven if Paula Kingman was predisposed to injury in her right shoulder, ... Missouri law ... requires the tortfeasor to compensate her for resulting injury. Kingman v. Dillard's, Inc., No. 06-0907, 2010 WL 2710716, at  (W.D.Mo. July 7, 2010). The district court did not err as a matter of law in concluding that even if Paula was predisposed to injury in her right shoulder, Dillard's is required to compensate her for the injuries she sustained on November 14, 2004. Under Missouri law, the plaintiff in a personal injury action is not entitled to recover damages for conditions that are due entirely and wholly to previous disease or injuries, but may recover for the aggravation of existing ailments caused by the negligent acts of [the] defendant. Schide v. Gottschick, 329 Mo. 64, 43 S.W.2d 777, 782 (1931). The aggravation of existing ailments for which a plaintiff may recover includes such damages as proximately result from the activation of dormant disease. Widener v. St. Louis Pub. Serv. Co., 360 Mo. 761, 230 S.W.2d 698, 701 (1950) (citing Owen v. Dix, 210 Ark. 562, 196 S.W.2d 913, 915 (1946) (disc in plaintiff's spine was diseased and hence weaker and more susceptible to rupture than a normal disc); Hackley v. Robinson, 219 N.W. 398, 398-99 (Iowa 1928) (car accident caused plaintiff's dormant or inactive tuberculosis to become revivified)). In Miller v. Gulf, Mobile & Ohio R.R. Co., 386 S.W.2d 97 (Mo.1964), the Supreme Court of Missouri considered the case of an overweight fireman with a history of osteoarthritis in his left knee who slipped on a step attached to a fire engine and wrenched his left knee. After a long series of treatments and operation, the knee was left permanently damaged. At trial, the question was whether or not the alleged fall aggravated the pre-existing conditions to any substantial extent, or whether plaintiff's subsequent and final condition was due to the natural progress of [the osteoarthritis, combined with the wear and tear of bearing the man's weight over a period of years]. Id. at 100. Reciting the rule that the plaintiff could not recover damages on account of pre-existing diseases or for the normal development thereof, the Supreme Court of Missouri explained what this meant: while the plaintiff could not recover for the osteoarthritis or for any damages resulting therefrom, and which are not the direct result of the [accident], ... the plaintiff could recover for any damage resulting from prior conditions which were also the direct result of the [accident]. Id. at 102-03 (emphasis in original). Applying Miller to the facts of our case, because the district court found that Paula's post-November 2004 shoulder problems were a direct result of the Dillard's incident, Paula was entitled to recover for those injuries. Even if Paula's 1990 shoulder injury left her right shoulder weaker than an ordinary person's, and thus more susceptible to serious injury, Dillard's is liable for the full measure of damages that resulted when the clothing rack struck her shoulder and, thereby, aggravated a condition that had been dormant for over a decade. Regarding the attribution of Paula's present condition to the Dillard's incident, the district court's factual findings are supported by the evidence. In particular, the testimony of two orthopaedic surgeons who examined Paula support the district court's findings. Dr. Reardon, who performed the first two of Paula's three shoulder surgeries, explained that shoulder problems like Paula's could be caused by a blunt trauma. He was unable to determine whether the Dillard's incident was the sole cause of Paula's shoulder pain because he had not reviewed Paula's complete medical history. In his view, though, the Dillard's incident at least significantly contributed to that pain. Thus, Dr. Reardon's testimony is consistent with the district court's finding, based on its review of Paula's complete medical history, that the Dillard's incident was the cause of [Paula's] generally constant shoulder muscle problems from 2004. Kingman, 2010 WL 2710716, at . This finding is also directly supported by the testimony of Dr. Swaim, who did review Paula's full medical history and concluded that the Dillard's incident caused or was the prevailing factor to cause all of Paula's shoulder joint problems and need for medical treatment of the shoulder since November 2004 and going forward. Thus, while it might be possible to draw a different conclusion from the evidence in the record, the district court's findings represent a choice between two permissible views of evidence, and therefore cannot be clearly erroneous. See Estate of Davis, 115 F.3d at 1393-94. Moreover, Dillard's is incorrect regarding the burden of proof. As the Supreme Court of Missouri explained in Miller, Paula was required to demonstrate only substantial evidence of aggravation. 386 S.W.2d at 102 (The line between an aggravation and the normal progress of a chronic pathological condition may be a hazy one, but under our practice a jury is entitled to make the finding if there is substantial evidence of aggravation.). Once Paula satisfied the elements of her claim, the burden was on Dillard's to challenge the extent to which her injuries were directly attributable to its own negligence. Carlton v. Phillips, 926 S.W.2d 8, 12-13 (Mo.Ct.App.1996) (Once [the plaintiff] satisfied the elements of her claim, it becomes the burden of the individual defendants to challenge the extent of appellant's injuries directly attributable to their own negligence.); see also Sparks v. Ballenger, 373 S.W.2d 955, 958 (Mo.1964) (holding that although a plaintiff must ... produce evidence from which a jury may draw an inference that the plaintiff was injured as a result of defendant's negligence, the plaintiff need not with certainty or exactness prove the extent of his damages). Thus, because neither party offered any evidence on how to apportion damages, it was Dillard's, and not Paula, who failed to meet its burden of proof. Finally, the district court's holding is consistent with Missouri's conception of proximate causation. In Missouri, the plaintiff's injury must be a reasonable and probable consequence of the act or omission of the defendant. Callahan v. Cardinal Glennon Hosp., 863 S.W.2d 852, 865 (Mo.1993) (en banc). The Supreme Court of Missouri has explained that [t]his is generally a `look back' test but, to the extent it requires that the injury be `natural and probable,' it probably includes a sprinkling of foreseeability. Id. Thus, the defendant is liable even for unusual injuries to the plaintiff if the defendant could have foreseen that an injury of some kind would result from his negligence. Id.; see also Robinson v. Mo. State Highway & Transp. Comm'n, 24 S.W.3d 67, 78 (Mo.Ct.App.2000) ([I]n order for an act to constitute the proximate cause of an injury, some injury, if not the precise one in question, must have been reasonably foreseeable. (internal quotation marks omitted)). This foreseeability threshold is met in the instant case because it was reasonably foreseeable that some injury, even if not a serious shoulder injury, might result from a high-hanging clothing rack falling from the wall onto a customer. Accordingly, we affirm the district court's award of $186,388 in damages to Paula.