## Facts

- Jason A. Majors was driving a car that collided with a 72,500-pound truck driven by Gary T. Hillebrand, who was acting within the scope of employment with the Kansas Department of Transportation (KDOT).
- Majors’s six-year-old daughter was in the rear passenger seat.
- Just before impact, Majors saw a snow bar attachment on the truck break through his windshield and the passenger-side windows, causing major passenger-side damage.
- Immediately after the collision, Majors saw his daughter with extensive head injuries and believed she was dead until she began responding after he removed her from the car.
- Beginning the night after the accident, Majors reported anxiety, fear, and nightmares; he later alleged PTSD, sleeping disorder, and hypertension that prevented him from working, attributed to the trauma of believing his daughter had died.
- Mental-health professionals attributed Majors’s psychological symptoms to the collision.
- Majors admitted he suffered no physical injury from the collision, had no visible signs of injury, did not bleed, did not require emergency care, and did not obtain medical treatment for injury until seeking counseling about a year later.
- Hillebrand was dismissed as a defendant; the remaining defendants were KDOT and the Secretary of Transportation.

## Issues

1. Whether Kansas law permits recovery for negligent infliction of emotional distress absent physical injury.
2. Whether an intermediate appellate court should abandon or modify Kansas’s physical-injury requirement for negligent infliction of emotional distress based on severe, medically documented psychological harm.

## Decision

- The Kansas Court of Appeals affirmed summary judgment for KDOT.
- The court held Kansas law requires physical injury to recover emotional distress damages in a negligence action framed as negligent infliction of emotional distress.
- Because Majors conceded he suffered no physical injury, there was no genuine issue of material fact and the claim failed as a matter of law.
- The court declined to overturn the physical-injury rule and followed stare decisis, leaving any change to the Kansas Supreme Court or the legislature.

## Legal Principles

- In Kansas, negligent infliction of emotional distress generally requires emotional distress to be accompanied by, or result in, physical injury; without physical injury, emotional distress damages are not recoverable in negligence.
- Summary judgment is appropriate when the material facts are undisputed and the claimant cannot meet a required element of the claim under controlling law.
- Intermediate appellate courts ordinarily apply established precedent and do not alter major tort doctrines absent direction from higher authority.
- Policy rationales supporting the physical-injury requirement include limiting speculative or fraudulent claims and avoiding unlimited or unpredictable liability based solely on subjective emotional harm.

## Conclusion

The court affirmed summary judgment because Kansas requires a physical injury to sustain a negligent infliction of emotional distress claim, and Majors admitted he suffered none; the court refused to change the rule under stare decisis.


Majors v. Hillebrand, 349 P.3d 1283 (Kan. Ct. App. 2015)