Opinion ID: 2390586
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Remaining Claims against the Defendants

Text: At trial, a jury awarded the plaintiff damages against the defendants in the amounts of $5,300 in compensatory damages, and $4,700 in punitive damages. These damages were based on: (1) the jury's determination that the defendants had intentionally interfered with the plaintiff's prescriptive easement; (2) for the tort of outrage and invasion of the plaintiff's right of privacy, because the defendants had photographed the plaintiff using the gravel lane and tape recorded a conversation between the plaintiff and one of the defendants; and (3) civil conspiracy. After careful examination of the record, we find no evidence proving the legal elements of these causes of action. First, the jury concluded that the defendants had intentionally interfered with the plaintiff's prescriptive easement allowing his ingress and egress on the gravel lane. As we just established, the plaintiff has no legal right of ingress and egress. [37] Accordingly, to the extent the jury's award is based on this claim by the plaintiff, it must be vacated. Second, the jury concluded that the defendants had engaged in outrageous conduct, and had invaded the plaintiff's privacy. We set forth the elements of a cause of action for the tort of outragemore often referred to as the intentional or reckless infliction of emotional distressin Syllabus Point 3 of Travis v. Alcon Laboratories, Inc., 202 W.Va. 369, 504 S.E.2d 419 (1998), where we stated: In order for a plaintiff to prevail on a claim for intentional or reckless infliction of emotional distress, four elements must be established. It must be shown: (1) that the defendant's conduct was atrocious, intolerable, and so extreme and outrageous as to exceed the bounds of decency; (2) that the defendant acted with the intent to inflict emotional distress, or acted recklessly when it was certain or substantially certain emotional distress would result from his conduct; (3) that the actions of the defendant caused the plaintiff to suffer emotional distress; and, (4) that the emotional distress suffered by the plaintiff was so severe that no reasonable person could be expected to endure it. We stated in Travis that trial courts should first examine the proof presented by the plaintiff to determine if the defendant's conduct may legally be considered extreme and outrageous. We held, in Syllabus Point 4 of Travis: In evaluating a defendant's conduct in an intentional or reckless infliction of emotional distress claim, the role of the trial court is to first determine whether the defendant's conduct may reasonably be regarded as so extreme and outrageous as to constitute the intentional or reckless infliction of emotional distress. Whether conduct may reasonably be considered outrageous is a legal question, and whether conduct is in fact outrageous is a question for jury determination. We first recognized a right of privacy in Roach v. Harper, 143 W.Va. 869, 105 S.E.2d 564 (1958). We stated, in Syllabus Point 1 of Roach: The right of privacy, including the right of an individual to be let alone and to keep secret his private communications, conversations and affairs, is a right the unwarranted invasion or violation of which gives rise to a common law right of action for damages. We have said that there are at least four ways that the right to privacy may be invaded: An invasion of privacy includes (1) an unreasonable intrusion upon the seclusion of another; (2) an appropriation of another's name or likeness; (3) unreasonable publicity given to another's private life; and (4) publicity that unreasonably places another in a false light before the public. Syllabus Point 8, Crump v. Beckley Newspapers, Inc., 173 W.Va. 699, 320 S.E.2d 70 (1984). The plaintiff appears to assert that the defendants unreasonably intruded upon his seclusion, by the defendants (a) taking his photograph as he drove on the gravel lane, and (b) surreptitiously tape recording a conversation one of the defendants had with the plaintiff while standing on the lane. After careful examination of the record, we see no evidence of emotional distress by the plaintiff that was so severe no reasonable person could be expected to endure it. Syllabus Point 3, Travis, supra . We find no evidence to support the conclusion that the defendants' actions, as a matter of law, were so extreme and outrageous as to constitute intentional infliction of emotional distress. Likewise, we see no evidence that the plaintiff's right to be let alone and to keep secret his private communications was in any way breached by the defendants. The plaintiff had no right to privacythat is, no right to not have his car photographed while driving in a public place. Further, the defendants did not record a secret, private communication; they recorded a public communication, between the plaintiff and one of the defendants, held in an open place. [38] The defendants' actions, while perhaps indignant and annoying, were not undertaken or expected to cause severe emotional distress to the plaintiff. The plaintiff's evidence does not show that the defendants' actions intentionally or recklessly inflicted emotional distress on the plaintiff. Instead, the defendants were correct in their belief that the plaintiff did not have a legal right to use the gravel lane. While the defendants do not own the gravel lane, the evidence presented demonstrates that the defendants have an easement to use the lane to access the Leetown Pike/Route 15 that is implied, either by necessity or by prior use of the lane. In Cobb v. Daugherty, 225 W.Va. 435, 693 S.E.2d 800 (2010), we defined an easement implied by necessity in Syllabus Point 4: To establish an easement implied by necessity (which in West Virginia is called a way of necessity), a party must prove four elements: (1) prior common ownership of the dominant and servient estates; (2) severance (that is, a conveyance of the dominant and/or servient estates to another); (3) at the time of the severance, the easement was strictly necessary for the benefit of either the parcel transferred or the parcel retained; and (4) a continuing necessity for an easement. In Syllabus Point 6 of Cobb, we defined an easement implied by a prior use of the land: To establish an easement implied by a prior use of the land, a party must prove four elements: (1) prior common ownership of the dominant and servient estates; (2) severance (that is, a conveyance of the dominant and/or servient estates to another); (3) the use giving rise to the asserted easement was in existence at the time of the conveyance dividing the property, and the use has been so long continued and so obvious as to show that the parties to the conveyance intended and meant for the use to be permanent; and (4) the easement was necessary at the time of the severance for the proper and reasonable enjoyment of the dominant estate. The record establishes a prior common ownership of the defendants' lot and Mr. Strider's 23-acre tract, as well as a severance in 1911. On the one hand, at the time the defendants' lot was created, it was strictly necessary, and continues to be necessary, for the defendants to be able to use the gravel lane to access a public highway. Hence, the defendants have an easement implied by necessity. On the other hand, in 1911, the gravel lane had clearly and obviously been in existence (as was evidenced by the 1899 deed of the third lot that gave the owner an express easement), the 1911 deed referred to the lane as a lane to public road, and the lane was necessary in 1911 for the reasonable enjoyment of the defendants' lot. Hence, the defendants can also establish an easement implied by a prior use of the gravel lane to access their lot. The defendants were apparently acting out of their sincere belief that the plaintiff was wrongfully using the gravel lane, and that the plaintiff's use of the lane would cause wear and tear that the defendants would be contractually obligated to repair. On this record, we believe that the trial court should, as a matter of law, have entered judgment for the defendants on the counts of outrage and invasion of privacy. The final count alleged by the plaintiff is that the defendants were engaged in a civil conspiracy. We recently set forth the definition of a civil conspiracy in Syllabus Points 8 and 9 of Dunn v. Rockwell, 225 W.Va. 43, 689 S.E.2d 255 (2009): 8. A civil conspiracy is a combination of two or more persons by concerted action to accomplish an unlawful purpose or to accomplish some purpose, not in itself unlawful, by unlawful means. The cause of action is not created by the conspiracy but by the wrongful acts done by the defendants to the injury of the plaintiff. 9. A civil conspiracy is not a per se, stand-alone cause of action; it is instead a legal doctrine under which liability for a tort may be imposed on people who did not actually commit a tort themselves but who shared a common plan for its commission with the actual perpetrator(s). We made clear in Dunn v. Rockwell that a civil conspiracy must be based on some underlying tort or wrong. As we have discussed above, for all of the torts or wrongs alleged by the plaintiff (interference with the plaintiff's prescriptive easement, outrage, and invasion of privacy) there is insufficient evidence to support the jury's verdict. Accordingly, we find that there is also insufficient evidence to support the jury's finding that the defendants engaged in a civil conspiracy to commit any of those alleged torts or wrongs.