## Facts

- Burlington Transportation Company operated buses in South Dakota and required passengers to surrender tickets to the driver at the door before boarding.
- Josephson, a New York physician temporarily in Rapid City, South Dakota, disputed with a Burlington bus driver about his right to ride while the bus was loading.
- Burlington’s Rapid City superintendent, S. L. Spargur, went to the police station and asked officers to remove Josephson from the company’s bus.
- Two city police officers took Josephson into custody, resulting in a detention that Josephson alleged was without lawful justification.
- Josephson sued Burlington and Spargur for false arrest and imprisonment, alleging reputational harm, humiliation and mental anguish, attorney’s fees and costs to secure release, and loss from being kept away from his business.
- Over objection, Josephson presented evidence of approximately $500 in attorney-related expenses and claimed economic losses tied to a building he owned (lost rent and increased renovation costs).

## Issues

1. Whether the district court erred by directing a verdict for Josephson on liability for false arrest/imprisonment against Burlington and Spargur rather than submitting disputed liability questions to the jury.
2. Whether the district court erred by denying a motion for a more definite statement seeking itemization of alleged business losses and by admitting proof of special business losses not fairly disclosed by the pleadings.
3. Whether the damages instructions were erroneous because they permitted recovery for categories of loss unsupported by proper pleading and proof.

## Decision

- The court of appeals reversed the judgment and remanded for a new trial on all issues.
- Liability should not have been taken from the jury because the evidence permitted conflicting inferences on whether Spargur instigated or procured the arrest and whether any justification or privilege applied.
- The district court erred in allowing the jury to consider special business-loss theories (including lost rent and increased renovation expenses) that were not specifically pleaded and were too remote or insufficiently connected to the detention.
- Because the jury’s damages award rested on an overly broad evidentiary and instructional basis and liability was erroneously directed, a full new trial was required.

## Legal Principles

- A directed verdict for a plaintiff is improper when essential elements (including instigation/procurement of an arrest and potential justification) depend on disputed facts or competing inferences; credibility and inference-drawing are for the jury.
- In false arrest/imprisonment actions, general damages may include reputational injury, humiliation, and mental anguish, plus reasonable expenses necessarily incurred to obtain release, including reasonable attorney-related expenses for that purpose.
- Special or consequential economic losses (such as discrete business losses or other particular financial consequences) must be specifically pleaded to give fair notice and must be proven with a sufficient causal connection; vague allegations of “consequent loss” may be inadequate when substantial special damages are sought.
- When special damages are not properly pleaded or are remote, admitting such evidence and instructing the jury to consider it constitutes prejudicial error.

## Conclusion

The court held that disputed questions regarding the defendants’ role in causing the arrest and any justification required jury resolution, and that the damages case was improperly expanded through insufficiently pleaded and weakly connected special business-loss evidence; it therefore reversed and ordered a new trial.


Burlington Transp. Co. v. Josephson, 153 F.2d 372 (8th Cir. 1946)