Mother ‘Virtually Present’ For Daughter’s Car Crash Can Get Damages

Mother ‘Virtually Present’ For Daughter’s Car Crash Can Get Damages

A recent California Supreme Court ruling shows that individuals can sue for emotional distress if they witnessed a close relative being injured in a negligent act while being virtually present through a live video stream during the incident.

Since Dillon v. Legg (1968) 68 Cal.2d 728), California courts have recognized a plaintiff’s right to recover in negligence for serious emotional distress suffered as a result of witnessing injuries inflicted on a close relative. Recovery for negligent infliction of emotional distress is available, however, only if the plaintiff “is present at the scene of the injury producing event at the time it occurs and is then aware that it is causing injury to the victim.” (Thing v. La Chusa (1989) 48 Cal.3d 644, 668).

In Downey v. City of Riverside, Plaintiff Jayde Downey argued that since she was “virtually present” during her daughter’s car crash through a live video stream, she should be able to recover damages for emotional distress, because witnessing a close relative’s injury in real-time, even through a digital medium, can constitute “being present at the scene for the purpose of legal claims.”

Downey’s daughter, Malyah Vance, was driving near the intersection of Canyon Crest Drive and Via Zapata in the City of Riverside and receiving driving instructions from Downey on her cell phone. While giving her daughter directions, Downey heard Vance suddenly gasp, and then heard the sounds of an explosive metal-on-metal vehicular crash, shattering glass, and rubber tires skidding or dragging across the asphalt.

As the sound of tires dragging across asphalt faded, Downey — having heard no sounds or vocalizations from Vance — understood that Vance was injured so seriously that she could not speak. This was confirmed by a stranger who rushed to the scene to help and told Downey over the phone to quiet down so that he could “find a pulse.” After the crash, Downey and Vance sued the driver of the other car involved in the collision. They also sued the City of Riverside and Ara and Vahram Sevacherian, the owners of private property adjacent to the intersection where the crash occurred. Among other things, their complaint sought recovery for negligent infliction of emotional distress on Downey, who suffered emotional trauma as a result of hearing her daughter’s accident occur in real time. Downey alleged the City was at least in part responsible for the accident, and thus for Downey’s emotional distress, because “[t]he traffic markings, signals, warnings, medians, and fixtures thereon (or lack thereof), were so located constructed, placed, designed, repaired, maintained, used, and otherwise defective in design, manufacture and warning that they constituted a dangerous condition of public property” that “created an unreasonable and foreseeable risk of injury and harm to occupants of vehicles in the intersection.” Downey alleged the Sevacherians, too, contributed to the accident by failing to trim vegetation on their property, which had obstructed the view of traffic turning from Via Zapata onto Canyon Crest Drive.

The City and the Sevacherians demurred to the complaint. They argued that Downey could not allege a negligent infliction of emotional distress claim against them because at the time of the collision she was not aware of how their alleged negligence had caused the collision. Agreeing with the defendants, the trial court sustained the demurrers without leave to amend. It explained that