Court Opinion

ID: 9714850
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 05:47:07.260878+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:29.023154
License: Public Domain

Wilkie, J.
(dissenting). I respectfully dissent. The majority opinion, as I understand it, would permit the plaintiff to continue his lawsuit if he had only alleged in his complaint that as a result of the emotional distress he suffered due to defendant’s negligence, he became *228physically ill. In other words, the majority give controlling importance to a physical manifestation.
The majority correctly point out that in Alsteen v. Gehl 1 we recognized that in a proper situation, a plaintiff could recover damages for intentionally inflicted emotional distress regardless of whether this emotional distress was subsequently physically manifested. We should now extend this protection to situations involving the negligent infliction of emotional distress regardless of whether a physical manifestation is attendant.
There is no longer any reason in logic or in fact to distinguish between intentional or negligent infliction of emotional distress. Both are equally difficult to prove. Both should compel recovery if injury results, be it purely emotional or partly physical. There is no reason to distinguish the form of the consequences produced by emotional distress. The damage is equally real whatever name is applied.
In recognizing a cause of action of this type there will undoubtedly be questions as to whether the plaintiff did in fact suffer the emotional distress complained of, or whether, if suffered, it was produced by defendant’s acts or some other cause. These are fact questions which can be answered only in the light of the evidence, including medical testimony, of the given case.
For this court to recognize a cause of action for negligent infliction of emotional distress without accompanying physical injury would not be as revolutionary as the majority opinion assumes. There have been some Wisconsin decisions which have paved the way.
For example, in Vinicky v. Midland Mut. Casualty Ins. Co.,2 this court affirmed a jury award of $2,000 for injury to a twelve-year-old boy where:
“. . . The side of his face was swollen and his eye was nearly shut. However, his principal claim for damages is *229based upon emotional injuries and mental distress that he suffered at the time of the accident and subsequent thereto.” 3
Also, in Ritter v. Coca-Cola Co.,4 this court affirmed a jury verdict of $2,500 in favor of a plaintiff who, when drinking from a bottle of coke, saw a partially decomposed mouse in the bottle. As a result she suffered great mental distress but chemical tests indicated that she sustained no toxic or physical injury other than vomiting from drinking the contaminated coke. In that case the issue of her right to recover was not raised and we decided the case on the issue of the admissibility of certain medical testimony.
These two cases implicitly, at least, recognize that a plaintiff who suffers great emotional distress is entitled to recover damages for the negligent infliction of such distress. The absence of a physical manifestation of such distress should not change this result since severe mental disturbances are almost always characterized by some type of physical reaction and frequently it is only an accident of pleading that the adverse consequences complained of are characterized as mental rather than physical.
I would affirm the order of the trial court.5
I am authorized to state that Mr. Chief Justice Hallows and Mr. Justice Heffernan join in this dissent.

 (1963), 21 Wis. 2d 349, 124 N. W. 2d 312.

 (1967), 35 Wis. 2d 246, 151 N. W. 2d 77.

 Id. at page 252.

 (1964), 24 Wis. 2d 157, 128 N. W. 2d 439.

 See generally: Campbell, Recent Developments of Tort Law in Wisconsin, CLEW (1969), pp. 59-62; Annot. Torts-Emotional Disturbances (1959), 64 A. L. R. 2d 100.