## Facts

- Marie P. Daly, a regular customer, fell in Duffy Brothers’ grocery store while carrying two large bags after her foot struck a pile of masonite molding stacked across an aisle.
- The molding had been moved into the aisle by Richard A. Hotch, an employee of Bergstedt-Nielsen Store Equipment Company, which was installing new store equipment while the store remained open.
- The molding was dark like the floor and stacked about 6 inches high.
- Daly was hospitalized after the fall and soon noticed a bruise on her left breast where she struck the floor; the bruise faded but pain continued.
- About 14 months later, a lump developed at the same location and was diagnosed as breast cancer.
- One physician testified the trauma caused the cancer; six physicians testified trauma could not cause breast cancer.
- A jury found all defendants liable and awarded Daly \$40,000; the trial court also granted indemnity to Duffy Brothers against Bergstedt, Nielsen, and Hotch.
- After trial and Daly’s death, her trustees/assignees continued the action.

## Issues

1. Whether the evidence was sufficient to submit to the jury the question that trauma from the fall caused or contributed to Daly’s later breast cancer.
2. Whether Duffy Brothers, though liable to the plaintiff as store operators, were entitled to indemnity from the contractor and its employee whose conduct created the tripping hazard.

## Decision

- Affirmed the denial of the contractor defendants’ motion for a new trial.
- Held the cancer-causation question was properly submitted to the jury; the verdict would not be disturbed.
- Affirmed indemnity in favor of Duffy Brothers against Bergstedt, Nielsen, and Hotch.

## Legal Principles

- Medical causation in tort may be submitted to the jury when expert testimony supporting causation, combined with a consistent sequence of post-accident events, permits a reasonable causal inference.
- A medical expert’s opinion need not be free from doubt or capable of scientific demonstration; conflicts among qualified experts generally present a fact question for the jury rather than a basis for taking the issue from it.
- Equitable indemnity may shift the entire loss between parties who are both liable to the plaintiff when, as between them, the injury resulted from the independent, primary negligence of one party in breach of a duty owed to the other.
- A premises operator’s liability that is secondary or derivative may support indemnity against an independent contractor whose active negligence created the dangerous condition.

## Conclusion

The court upheld the jury’s finding that the fall-related trauma could be found to have caused or contributed to the plaintiff’s later cancer based on one supporting expert and the ensuing physical progression, and it allowed the store operators to obtain indemnity from the contractor defendants because the hazard stemmed from the contractor employee’s independent, primary negligence.


Daly v. Bergstedt, 267 Minn. 244, 126 N.W.2d 242 (Minn. 1964)