Court Opinion

ID: 9670360
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:19:27.014203+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:04.090086
License: Public Domain

C. M. Forster, J.
(dissenting). I cannot join in the majority’s reversal of the trial court’s dismissal of plaintiffs complaint for two reasons.
First, the trial court relied on the holding in Sewell v Bathey Mfg Co, 103 Mich App 732; 303 NW2d 876 (1981), when it granted defendant’s motion for summary disposition. This decision predated the Supreme Court’s ruling in Beauchamp v Dow Chemical Co, 427 Mich 1; 398 NW2d 882 (1986). Based on case law then existing, the trial court’s decision was correct at the time it was made. I would remand to the trial court for further proceedings in light of Beauchamp. Morse v Loomis, 158 Mich App 519; 405 NW2d 404 (1987).
Second, if the trial motion is to be heard by this Court, instead of reviewed on appeal, I find that the facts as set forth in the compliant do not state a cause of action under the Beauchamp standard. The Beauchamp Court stressed that "substantial certainty should not be equated with substantial likelihood” of injury.
Following the Beauchamp opinion, this Court in *279Boyer v Louisville Ladder Co, Inc, 157 Mich App 716, 719; 403 NW2d 210 (1987), held:
[A] court must determine whether "the employer intended the act that caused the injury and knew that the injury was substantially certain to occur from the act.” 427 Mich 20, 25.
The Beauchamp Court cautioned, however that substantial certainty should not be equated with substantial likelihood. Further, a claim that an injury was caused by failure to provide safe working conditions is essentially a claim that the employee was injured by the employer’s negligence. 427 Mich 25.
We acknowledge that plaintiffs have alleged an intentional or deliberate act by the employer ultimately causing harm to the employee. However, we believe that plaintiffs have failed to plead facts constituting an intentional tort.
A mere knowledge and appreciation of the risk involved in an act is not the same as the intent to cause an injury. Beauchamp, supra. A result is intended if the act is done with the purposes of accomplishing the result or with knowledge that to a substantial certainty such a result will ensue.
Plaintiffs complaint fails to plead sufficient facts to constitute allegations that defendant committed an intentional tort. Whether tested pursuant to the Beauchamp standard of "substantial certainty” or in accord with prior case law, plaintiff was required to plead at a minimum that the employer intended the act that caused the injury and knew that the injury was substantially certain to occur from the act. The acts alleged by plaintiff do not rise to the level of the Film Recovery Systems case, as contemplated by the Supreme Court in Beauchamp, supra, p 23, to constitute a substantial certainty of injury.
For these reasons, I would affirm the trial court’s dismissal of plaintiffs complaint.