Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress, A Dangerous Cause of Action

This headline, Steelworker awarded $25 million in New York racial lawsuit might seem to come from a typical Title VII or Section 1981 case for racial discrimination.

According to the story in the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the plaintiff Elijah Turley, who is black, testified that

 "KKK" and "King Kong" graffiti were written on the walls of the plant and a stuffed monkey with a noose around its neck was found hanging from his driver's side mirror.

But it was not as if the company did nothing in response as evidence indicated that the company hired a private investigator, installed security cameras and suspended some of the employees involved in some of the incidents.

But it's my guess from another quote in the story that although based on racially based behavior, it was not a race discrimination claim, but instead a claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress. That's based on the quote from Turley's lawyer that the conduct was "atrocious and intolerable in a civilized society," which is language taken from the Restatement of Torts discussion of the tort of intentional infliction of emotional distress.

Texas struggled with this as an employment law tort, with approximately 10 cases passing the muster of that supposedly high standard at both the trial and appellate level only to be rejected by the Supreme Court. (One case did survive the Supreme Court's review.) Finally, the Supreme Court basically eliminated the tort from Texas employment law, finding that it was designed as a gap-filler, one that was to be used only if no other cause of action existed.

Unfortunately, for the defendants, they weren't in the Lone Star state.