Mississippi: False Imprisonment Action Against Employer Fails

A Mississippi trial court committed error when it failed to grant summary judgment to an employer in a civil action filed by the estate of a deceased employee alleging false imprisonment and infliction of emotional distress where plaintiffs presented no evidence of actual intent on the part of the employer’s supervising staff. Plaintiffs alleged that the deceased, a housekeeping services employee, called them and indicated she was experiencing strong chest pains and that her supervisor would not let her leave. The employee further indicated that if she left, she would likely be fired because it was a fully booked holiday weekend. Plaintiffs alleged they sought to drive to the defendant’s place of business to pick up the employee, but that while they were en route a co-worker called to say the employee had collapsed. The employee died at a nearby hospital. Plaintiffs contended the action of the employer in not allowing her to leave amounted to false imprisonment. The appellate court said the plaintiffs could not merely stand on the pleadings; they needed to come forward with some evidence of actual intent. Without such evidence, the cause of action could not stand.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is the co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance. Bracketed citations link to lexis.com.

See The Service Cos., Inc. v. Estate of Vaughn, 2015 Miss. LEXIS 363 (July 23, 2015) [2015 Miss. LEXIS 363 (July 23, 2015)]

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 104.02 [104.02]

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law.

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