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Jones v. Fayette Family Dental Care Inc.

The plaintiff failed to show that she suffered severe emotional distress as a result of seeing her employer masturbating in a hallway of his dental practice.

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Laura Jones and her husband John brought this action in the State Court of Fayette County against Dr. Rick Verdin and Fayette Family Dental Care, Inc. “the Practice”, for intentional infliction of emotional distress and for loss of consortium. Following a hearing, the trial court granted the motion for summary judgment filed by Verdin and the Practice, and the Joneses appeal. For the reasons explained below, we affirm. “Summary judgment is proper when there is no genuine issue of material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. We review the grant of summary judgment de novo, construing the evidence in favor of the nonmovant.”1

Viewed in favor of the Joneses, the record shows the following. In September 2007, Laura was employed by the Practice as a dental assistant, working for Verdin the dentist.2 According to Laura, on September 5, 2007, she walked out of an x-ray processing room and into a hallway, where she saw Verdin with his pants lowered. Verdin was holding his penis in his hand and was masturbating. Laura saw Verdin in profile for about five seconds before she turned and left; she does not know whether Verdin saw her or not. Before Laura left, Jennifer Spivey, another dental assistant who worked for the Practice, entered the hallway from the opposite direction and also saw Verdin masturbating. As he did so, he was looking at Spivey.

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