The Oklahoma Bar Journal September 2025

Thompson v. Minnis in holding, “Oklahoma law does not compen sate for mental anguish or distur bance alone – it must be part of the physical suffering and inseparable therefrom, as where the mental anguish is superinduced by physi cal hunger pains.” 37 In these cases, which dealt exclu sively with the negligent infliction of emotional distress, recovery was denied when the mental suffering was unaccompanied by a physi cal injury. But it was hunger that opened the door for Oklahomans to assert a variety of NIED claims. Mashunkashey v. Mashunkashey Meanwhile, case law on IIED began to quietly develop. The first big case was Mashunkashey v. Mashunkashey , 38 where the plaintiff sued the defendant for “inducing plaintiff to enter into the bigamous marriage” and sought compensatory and punitive damages “resulting from humiliation, injury to reputa tion, etc.” 39 The trial court annulled the marriage and awarded both compensatory and exemplary dam ages to the plaintiff. 40 In affirming, the Supreme Court of Oklahoma explained that the “prayer for damages was based on the allega tion of injured reputation, mental suffering and humiliation ... nothing

of a tangible nature upon which to base the pecuniary detriment suffered.” 41 And further, “Injury to reputation will support an action for damages; but mental pain and suffering alone will ordinarily con stitute but an element of damages.” 42 For the first time, however, the court delved into the willful nature of the defendant’s wrong, declaring, “Mental pain and suffering may constitute the basis of an independent action in cases of willful wrong of the character where mental suffering is recog nized as the ordinary, natural and proximate result of such wrong.” 43 In the court’s analysis, the defen dant’s fraud in inducing the plaintiff into a bigamous marriage consti tuted a willful wrong from which emotional distress would natu rally result. Specifically, mental pain and suffering “constituted a sufficient ground upon which to predicate her actions for deceit.” 44 In Mashunkashey, the court went a step further in explicating the damages. It opined, “As to mental pain and suffering, the court, or the jury, as the case may be, is autho rized to award such a sum as in its discretion will reasonably compen sate the plaintiff under the circum stances.” 45 Basically, the amount awarded to an aggrieved sufferer

of willful emotional distress (IIED) “is governed largely by the mental reaction of the jury, or court, based upon their knowledge and experi ence in observing human nature as affected by the particular facts and circumstances.” 46 Dean v. Chapman Later, when disco was thriving, the Oklahoma Supreme Court decided Dean v. Chapman , 47 a case about a public autopsy. In Dean, the plaintiff alleged mental injury when the defendant refused to conduct a timely autopsy of her father and then performed the autopsy at an outdoor and public site. 48 The court ultimately held that the act of conducting an autopsy on a partially decomposed body in public view was not of sufficient character to be considered a willful wrong of the nature contemplated by Mashunkashey . 49 (“This Court does not believe that mental anguish arising from the perfor mance of an autopsy pursuant to Court Order in open field where the body is partially decomposed is a case where mental anguish is recognized as an ordinary and natural consequence.”) 50 So appar ently, the distress of watching the decomposing body of a loved one being autopsied in public did not meet the court’s standards for an IIED claim. To justify its decision, the Dean court quoted Section 46 of the Restatement of Torts (Second) , Comment D: “The cases thus far decided have found liability only where the defendant’s conduct has been extreme and outrageous. It has not been enough that the defendant has acted with an intent which is tortious or even criminal, or that he has intended to inflict emotional distress, or even that his

The 80s saw a flurry of emotional distress cases in which courts finally ruled that physical suffering was not a prerequisite for such claims.

Statements or opinions expressed in the Oklahoma Bar Journal are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Oklahoma Bar Association, its officers, Board of Governors, Board of Editors or staff.

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THE OKLAHOMA BAR JOURNAL