Court Opinion

ID: 9579527
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:55:56.963195+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:35:34.438135
License: Public Domain

Smith, Justice,
dissenting.
Although I agree with much of what is said in Justice Weltner’s dissent, I write separately to emphasize several points which I think are important. First, I note that today’s majority opinion, while affirming the trial court’s dismissal of the plaintiff’s lawsuit, breaks new ground in Georgia tort law by recognizing for the first time that “at least in some situations, a person should be under a duty of care toward an unconceived child.” This declaration, while significant, is *12not really surprising; recognition of a preconception tort is logically consistent with this court’s prior progressive holdings in cases on prenatal torts and consonant with the better reasoned cases from foreign jurisdictions. See Hornbuckle v. Plantation Pipe Line Co., 212 Ga. 504 (93 SE2d 727) (1956); Porter v. Lassiter, 91 Ga. App. 712 (87 SE2d 100) (1955); Tucker v. Carmichael & Sons, 208 Ga. 201 (65 SE2d 909) (1951); Renslow v. Mennonite Hospital, 67 Ill. 2d 348 (367 NE2d 1250) (1977); Bergstreser v. Mitchell, 577 F2d 22 (8th Cir. 1978); Jorgensen v. Meade Johnson Laboratories, 483 F2d 237 (10th Cir. 1973).
Despite its recognition of the preconception tort, the majority reaches the wrong result in this case, ostensibly because “the negligence of the defendant Wills and the injuries resulting in the death of McAuley’s child are too remote ...” This conclusion, based on considerations of “proximate cause,” is incorrect for two reasons.
Causation is a jury question, and this case was erroneously taken from the jury by the trial judge’s grant of the motion to dismiss. Wills’ burden on the motion to dismiss was a heavy one, which was not satisfied in this case. Under the modern rules of procedure and our Civil Practice Act, a complaint need only set forth a claim for relief, and is no longer construed most strongly against the pleader. See OCGA § 9-11-8 (Code Ann. § 81A-108). “ ‘ “A motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim should not be granted unless it appears to a certainty that the plaintiff would be entitled to no relief under any state of facts which could be proved in support of his claim. If, within the framework of the complaint, evidence may be introduced which will sustain a grant of relief to the plaintiff, the complaint is sufficient.” ’ ” Oliver v. Irvin, 230 Ga. 248, 249 (196 SE2d 429) (1973). We should reverse on the narrow ground that the trial court erred when it granted Wills’ motion in this case.
More important is the question of duty. Contrary to the majority opinion, I believe the controlling issue in this appeal is not causation, but duty — specifically, whether under the facts of this case Wills owed a legal duty to a child not yet conceived at the time of his alleged negligent conduct. I think such a duty exists and that McAuley should be allowed to present her case to the jury.
According to Professor Leon Green, any negligence case may be analyzed by reference to four separate, but interrelated, steps. They are: “(1) Did defendant’s conduct contribute to the victim’s injury (the causal relation issue)? (2) Was the victim protected under the law against the defendant’s conduct with respect to the injury inflicted on him (the duty issue)? (3) Did defendant violate his duty under the law with respect to the victim’s injury (the negligence issue)? (4) What is the evaluation in money of the losses suffered by *13the victim as a result of his injury (the damage issue)?” Green, The Causal Relation Issue in Negligence Law, 60 Mich. L. Rev. 543 (1962). A brief review of these four steps will, I believe, place the real issues in this case in a clearer light.

The Causal Relation Issue

“The beginning point of all tort liability is affirmative conduct, and the first step in establishing a defendant’s liability is to identify him and connect his conduct with the victim’s injury.” Id. at 546. “The [causal relation] inquiry is limited to the fact of the defendant’s contribution to the injury . . . Conduct is a factual concept; the victim’s hurt is a factual concept; caused relation is a factual concept. Duty, negligence, and damages are legal concepts and depend upon different considerations from those involved in the determination of causal relation.” Id. at 548-49. Thus the causal relation issue remains ever the same: Did the defendant’s conduct contribute to the plaintiffs injury?
As long as the evidence will support a reasonable inference that the defendant’s conduct played a part in the victim’s injury (even though other inferences can be drawn as to causation), it is for the jury, not the judge, to decide the issue of factual causation. See Sanders v. Atchison, 336 P2d 324 (N. Mex. 1959). In nearly every case contributing causes can be identified, and serious questions of duty, negligence and damages may arise. But in negligence cases all the trial court needs to know about causation is that the defendant’s conduct contributed to the injury. See Hart & Honore, Causation in the Law, 103 (1959). If so, then the case should go to the jury. Presiding Judge McMurray’s dissent in the Court of Appeals was eminently correct on this point: “The issue of proximate cause (as well as negligence and such related issues as assumption of the risk, lack of ordinary care for one’s own safety and comparative and contributory negligence) is generally a question of fact for the jury’s determination and may only be decided as a matter of law in clear and palpable cases where the evidence is so clear as to lead to only one conclusion, that is, that the defendants’ acts were not the proximate cause of the plaintiffs’ injury.” McAuley v. Wills, 164 Ga. App. 812, 818 (298 SE2d 594) (1982). The evidence was not “clear and palpable” in this case.

The Duty Issue

Once the causal relation between the defendant’s conduct and the victim’s injury is established, the inquiry is directed to the defendant’s duty to the victim. “This is a policy problem — a matter of law. The usual inquiry made of an advocate for the plaintiff in a doubtful case is: ‘Have you any law to support your claim? ’ This is the whole import of the duty concept... In most cases the law has already *14been determined by former decisions or by statute under which a doctrine or rule governing defendant’s conduct is firmly established. But if defendant’s conduct is different in some significant respect from that involved in former cases, it must be determined whether the rule or doctrine relied on should be expanded, modified, or reformulated to include or exclude the conduct of defendant which contributed to the victim’s hurt. If there is no law at hand, the court may be called upon to make new law, and this it does however it may rule. Since courts must of necessity rely heavily upon legal concepts and rules for the administration of law, their concepts and rules must be under continuous reconsideration in order that they may be adjusted to accommodate the facts of new cases. It is in this way that the law grows and escapes sterility.” Green, supra, at 563-64. See Elbert v. City of Saginaw, 363 Mich. 562, 563 (109 NW2d 879) (1961). If this were not true then the law of torts would never have emerged from the criminal law, prenatal injuries would never have been recognized, and the Georgia courts would never have progressed from recognizing prenatal injuries to the quick fetus to prenatal injuries to the fetus at any time after conception, then to the present recognition by the majority that at least in some situations a person should be under a duty of care toward an unconceived child. With this record of progress in foreign and Georgia law and the majority’s concession that in some situations a duty of care extends to an unconceived child, this case is a perfect example of where a jury should be allowed to decide liability based upon the facts presented here.
This is certainly true in view of the policy in Georgia of favoring protection of unborn persons. See Tucker v. Carmichael, supra (prenatal tort action); OCGA § 44-6-65 (Code Ann. § 85-706) (protection of unborn’s property interests); OCGA § 16-5-80 (Code Ann. § 26-1105) (crime of feticide); OCGA § 16-12-140 (Code Ann. §§ 26-1201, 26-1204) (regulation of abortion). See generally Stubbs, Georgia Law of Children, §§ 167, 168, 169, 190, 227 (1969). Recognition of a preconception tort is a proper exercise of this court’s law-making function, and is consistent with OCGA § 9-2-3 (Code Ann. § 3-105), which provides that “[f]or every right there shall be a remedy; every court having jurisdiction of the one may, if necessary, frame the other.”
The holding by this court in Hornbuckle v. Plantation Pipe Line Co., supra, that an unborn child has a cause of action as the result of any injury received at any time after conception, together with the majority’s recognition that a person may owe a duty of care to preconceived children, certainly provides legal support for a policy of care toward preconceived children. I feel that with this legal background, the cases from other jurisdictions, and the facts in this *15case, the defendant owed a duty of care to avoid preconception injury to McAuley’s child. The trial court’s grant of summary judgment precluded the jury from deciding whether under the facts of this case the defendant breached this duty.

The Negligence Issue

Once duty has been defined by the courts, it remains to be determined in a particular case whether the defendant violated his duty to the victim. In other words, was the defendant negligent? As a rule this is a question of fact for the jury to decide. “The negligence concept by its very terms is failure to exercise care at some stage of an undertaking assumed by the defendant.’ ” Green, supra, at 571. As to foreseeability, the rule in Georgia is that “[i]n order for a party to be liable as for negligence, it is not necessary that he should have been able to anticipate the particular consequences which ensued. It is sufficient, if in ordinary prudence he might have foreseen that some injury would result from his act or omission, or that consequences of a generally injurious nature might result.” Williams v. Grier, 196 Ga. 327, 337-338 (26 SE2d 698) (1943). See also Mixon v. Dobbs Houses, Inc., 149 Ga. App. 481 (254 SE2d 864) (1979). In addition, the unforeseeability of the manner in which a result is brought about does not relieve the defendant of responsibility. Bunting v. Hogsett, 139 Pa. 363 (21 A 31) (1891).

The Damage Issue

Again, this is an area where the jury, guided by proper instructions from the court, is given wide latitude in a negligence case. “ [S] o long as the amount is not outrageously large or small it will usually be permitted to stand in absence of some overt misconduct of the jury or in absence of some vital error committed in the trial process.” Green, supra, at 575. See Atlanta Metallic Casket Co. v. Hollingsworth, 107 Ga. App. 594 (131 SE2d 61) (1963).
Because I would hold that defendant Wills owed a duty to avoid injury to the unconceived child of McAuley and that the case should have been submitted to the jury on the issue of causation, I respectfully dissent to Division 5 and would reverse.