Court Opinion

ID: 9551918
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 19:02:04.001113+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:25:04.915965
License: Public Domain

HOLMAN, J.,
concurring.
The principal opinion expresses the view that a lawyer should be required to tell the trial court the theory upon which his case should be submitted to the jury. This opinion is supported by the public’s interest in the efficient use of the judicial process. The dissenting opinion takes the position that as long as plaintiff’s conglomeration of facts entitled him to go to the jury upon some theory, it is not fatal if he is unable to inform the court precisely of that theory. This opinion is supported by the public’s interest in seeing that justice be served in individual cases.
No hard and fast rule can be laid down for the determination of cases in which two public interests are competing for primacy. Each case must be weighed on its facts. Here we have a case in which the facts rest on that further, imprecise edge of the law where change is taking place and law is being formulated. In such cases, which are not numerous, I would cast *614my vote on the side of giving the plaintiff an opportunity to present his facts to the jury if they warrant it, despite his inability to formulate a precise theory for doing so. The standard demanded of plaintiff and his lawyer should not be as precise as where the legal paths have been frequently traveled.
The next question is whether plaintiff’s facts made out the tort of outrageous conduct and, thus, entitled his case to go to the jury on his claim for emotional and physical injuries. The evidence is capable of the inference that defendant was attempting to retain unlawfully the balance of several hundred dollars owing to plaintiff from the proceeds of the' resale of plaintiff’s truck and that, in addition, defendant was trying to gouge him for an additional $531 to which defendant knew it was not entitled.
Restatement of the Law of Torts (Second) § 46, comment d., has the following to say concerning what constitutes outrageous conduct:
“The cases thus far decided have found liability only where the defendant’s conduct has been extreme and outrageous. 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. Generally, the ease is one in which the recitation of the facts to an average member of the community would arouse his resentment against the actor, and lead him to exclaim, ‘Outrageous!’ ”
*615The kind of conduct of which plaintiff’s proof infers defendant was guilty is in the nature of attempted fraud. Plaintiff did not rely on what he was told, and defendant’s attempt to take advantage of plaintiff was unsuccessful. There was no evidence of almost daily harassment or unusual methods of attempted collection of debts which form the basis for almost all similar cases of outrageous conduct.① Although the proof is capable of the interpretation that defendant’s conduct was reprehensible in that it was dishonest, I do not get the feeling that a case of attempted fraud, minus unusual, bizarre, and particularly abusive methods of execution, is what the rule contemplates.②
I, therefore, concur in the result reached in the principal opinion.
O’Connell, C. J., and Denecke, J., join in this concurring opinion.

 Of those cases cited in the dissenting opinion, all appear to be examples of daily harassment or unusual methods of attempted collection, or both, excepting Fletcher v. Western National Life Insurance Co., 10 Cal App 3d 376, 89 Cal Rptr 78 (1970).

 The dissenting opinion expresses concern because a layman would consider it outrageous that plaintiff does not recover even the amount defendant owed plaintiff. Perhaps the layman would not consider it to be so outrageous if it were explained to him that plaintiff did not choose to bring a cause of action on the basis of defendant’s retaining money belonging to plaintiff, but, rather, elected to gamble on a speculative theory of recovery in the hope of securing large damages.

 The “principal opinion” is joined in by two members of the court, while the “concurring opinion” is joined in by three members.