Court Opinion

ID: 9723993
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:40:27.076981+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:53.980668
License: Public Domain

Mr. JUSTICE LINN, specially concurring: I agree that parents should be able to seek compensation for the costs of raising and educating a healthy child in cases such as the present ones. In doing so, I recognize that the decision reached today contradicts a previous decision from another division of this court. Though normally I would feel compelled to follow recent decisions from other divisions of this court, I cannot in good conscience accept either the reasoning or the result of the opinion in Wilczynski v. Goodman (1979), 73 Ill. App. 3d 51, 391 N.E.2d 479, as far as it determined that parents could not seek compensation for the costs of rearing a healthy child when a physician’s negligence in performing a legal abortion caused the child to be born. The reasoning relied upon by the court in Wilczynski was that such compensation would violate a supposed public policy which considers all abortions wrong, regardless of the actual law, and thus considers life to be an “esteemed right” rather than a compensable wrong. (73 Ill. App. 3d 51, 62, 391 N.E.2d 479, 487.) Though such reasoning may be applicable to whether the unwanted healthy child could state a cause of action against the physician on his own behalf, it has no application to whether the parents should recover damages for the injury to their rights. Even assuming life is an “esteemed right” and one’s life is precious to oneself, it does not follow that one’s existence automatically confers a benefit and no burden on those having a duty to assure one’s life is preserved throughout childhood. Additionally, to raise, as was done in Wilczynski, questions of ethics, morality, and so-called “pro-life” has no place in a case concerning whether a physician should be liable for his negligence and suggests that emotion rather than reasoning can be used to determine the issue. The only real issue is one of compensable damages, and this question must be determined without indulging in philosophical or religious nonissues. Though I agree that the parents should be allowed to seek compensation for the costs of rearing a healthy child, I cannot agree with the conclusion that the benefits the parents may derive from the parent-child relationship should be ignored in determining the amount of damages. My fellow Justice believes that such benefits cannot be considered because no special benefit has been conferred on the interest that has been harmed — the right of the parents to choose whether they will have a child. However, I think that this narrow application of the “special benefits” rule will create inequitable results because it presumes that the injury done to the parents’ interests is the same in all cases. One must recognize that the reasons parents have for practicing birth control vary and any injury done to their interests as parents will be different in each case. Can it be said that parents in their twenties who merely wanted to postpone having a child will suffer the same degree of injury from a physician’s negligence in causing a child to be born as will parents in their forties who already have grown children and have decided not to undergo the burden of raising any more children? Damages should be awarded based on the degree of injury that has occurred, and by allowing the potential benefits that the parents may derive from the parent-child relationship to be considered as one factor in determining the amount of damages will result in redressing the degree of injury that has been caused. Thus, I believe the proper rule to be that any potential benefits that the parents may derive from the parent-child relationship, whether they be in the form of companionship, the possibility of future financial support, or otherwise, should be one factor the trier of fact should be allowed to consider in determining the amount of damages. The injury done by a physician’s negligence is, in effect, an injury done to the parents’ overall “family interests” and the benefits that may be derived are benefits to those “family interests.” Accord, Troppi v. Scarf (1971), 31 Mich. App. 240, 187 N.W.2d 511. However, this does not mean that I agree with the defendants’ argument that in all cases the parents will be expected to derive such an overwhelming emotional benefit from having a healthy child that damages should be nominal, if anything, as a matter of law. Whether there will be any benefits and the value of any possible benefits are not issues of law. Each case depends on its own facts. Poor parents with many children may actually be expected to derive more stress than pleasure from having an additional child. Older parents who have chosen not to have any more children may not be expected to derive the same degree of benefit from having an additional child as younger parents who have chosen merely to postpone having a child. The trier of fact should be allowed to consider many factors, including family size, family income, the age of the parents, and marital status, to determine the existence or value of any potential benefits. Troppi v. Scarf (1971), 31 Mich. App. 240, 187 N.W.2d 511. Finally, I admit that the determination of the existence or value of any possible benefits involves a degree of speculation, but I do not see how allowing the trier of fact to make the determination will result in any more speculation than when the trier of fact is presently called upon to determine the existence or value of pain and suffering in personal injury cases, of severe emotional distress in cases of intentional infliction of emotional distress, or of companionship in loss of consortium cases. Accordingly, I concur in the decision of this court as far as it allows the parents to seek compensation for the costs of raising a healthy child in cases such as the present ones, but I would allow any possible benefits the parents may derive from the parent-child relationship to be one factor a trier of fact may consider in determining the amount of damages.