Court Opinion

ID: 9774126
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 18:09:20.751835+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:32:02.552884
License: Public Domain

NYE, Chief Justice,
dissenting.
I agree with most of the majority’s holding in this case; however, the majority errs by reversing a part of the summary judgment that dismisses Casas’ intentional infliction of emotional distress claim. There is no evidence showing the element of extreme and outrageous conduct by appel-lees, her employers. For this reason, I respectfully dissent.
This tort is an established one, with a life of its own, applying to an infinite variety of conduct not limited to discharge or even to the employment context. Abston v. Levi Strauss & Co., 684 F.Supp. 152, 157 (E.D.Tex.1987) (quoting 3A A. Larson, Employment Discrimination, § 119.20 at 26-64 (1987 ed.)). The Restatement (Second) of Torts sets out the guiding principles of this cause of action, stating in pertinent part:
It has not been enough that the defendant has acted with an intent which is tortious or even criminal, or that he has intended to inflict emotional distress, or even that his conduct has been characterized by “malice,” or a degree of aggravation which would entitle the plaintiff to punitive damages for another tort. Liability has been found only where the conduct has been so outrageous in character, and so extreme in degree, as to go beyond all possible bounds of decency, and to be regarded as atrocious, and utterly intolerable in a civilized community....
The liability clearly does not extend to mere insults, indignities, threats, annoyances, petty oppressions, or other trivialities .... There is no occasion for the law to intervene in every case where someone’s feelings are hurt....
The extreme and outrageous character of the conduct may arise from an abuse by the actor of a position, or a relation with the other, which gives him actual or apparent authority over the other, or power to affect his interests.
Restatement (Second) of Torts § 46, comments d, e (1965).1
The Abston court cited Alcorn v. Anbro Eng'g, Inc., 2 Cal.3d 493, 86 Cal.Rptr. 88, 468 P.2d 216 (1970), and Lucas v. Brown & Root, Inc., 736 F.2d 1202 (8th Cir.1984) as two cases illustrating “extreme and outrageous” conduct by an employer. The court also observed that some courts consider the relationship between an employer and an at-will employee a factor in finding the employer liable for outrageous conduct because their position is one in which the employee is particularly vulnerable. Abston, 684 F.Supp. at 157. Nevertheless, it must be emphasized that it is only where the emotional state is “extreme” that liability for severe emotional distress arises; this means that the distress inflicted on the plaintiff is so severe that no reasonable person could be expected to endure it without undergoing unreasonable suffering. Tidelands Auto. Club v. Walters, 699 S.W.2d 939, 941 (Tex.App.— Beaumont 1985, writ ref’d n.r.e.).
In Alcorn, the plaintiff, a Black male and a truck driver employed by defendant Anb-ro, was the shop steward for the Teamster’s Union. On the day of the incident, *473the plaintiff advised Palmer, a Caucasian male and Anbro’s field superintendent and shop foreman, that he [plaintiff] had advised another Anbro employee not to drive a certain truck to the job site because the employee was not a teamster. Palmer allegedly immediately responded by shouting at the plaintiff in a rude, violent and insolent manner as follows:
You goddam ‘niggers’ are not going to tell me about the rules. I don’t want any ‘niggers’ working for me. I am getting rid of all the ‘niggers’; go pick up and deliver that 8-ton roller to the other job site and get your pay check; you're fired.
Thereafter Anbro’s secretary, another Caucasian male, allegedly confirmed and ratified Palmer’s acts, including plaintiff’s discharge. The trial court dismissed the plaintiff’s intentional infliction of emotional distress claim. The Alcorn court reinstated the plaintiff's cause of action, observing that it was for the court to determine, in the first instance, whether the defendant’s conduct may reasonably be regarded as so extreme and outrageous as to permit recovery, or whether it is necessarily so. Alcorn, 468 P.2d at 219; see also Restatement (Second) Torts, § 46, comment h (1965).
In Lucas, the plaintiff brought an action for intentional infliction of emotional distress, alleging that the defendant-employer's extreme and outrageous conduct included her supervisor’s sexually propositioning her and placing her job on the line, as well as Brown & Root’s contesting her unemployment compensation by alleging that she was discharged for misconduct, namely, for failing to return to work or to call in, when it had made misrepresentations to her regarding receipt of unemployment benefits. The court held that these allegations were sufficient to state a cause of action for this tort and reversed the summary judgment against the plaintiff’s claim.
In the present case, Casas has not alleged any facts amounting to “extreme and outrageous” conduct by appellees. She was dismissed in private. Although she was escorted to the entrance to the complex and not allowed to re-enter the complex, she fails to show that such a practice was done in a demeaning manner or that it was somehow not within appellees’ purview as a business proprietor. There is no evidence of vituperative language or vindictive conduct. See Alcorn, 468 P.2d at 219 n. 5.
I would hold that Casas failed to show by proper summary judgment evidence conduct by appellees sufficiently outrageous to establish a prima facie case of intentional infliction of emotional distress. I would affirm the trial court’s summary judgment dismissing this cause of action.

. The Restatement offers several examples of extreme and outrageous conduct, namely, (a) threats of arrest by a private detective posing as a police officer, (b) false accusations and threats of imprisonment and personal as well as parental disgrace within the community by a high school principal to a student to coerce a "confession,” and (c) lurid letters from a creditor to a debtor depicting lightning about to strike, attacking the debtor’s character and promising a lawsuit, garnishment of wages and to effect the debtor's discharge from employment.