## Facts

- Brianna Sharp, a registered nurse, worked for Cleveland Clinic beginning in March 2006.
- Supervisors counseled Sharp multiple times in April and May 2006 for narcotics-documentation errors, including incidents where fentanyl amounts were not properly documented as wasted or otherwise accounted for.
- On May 24, 2006, Sharp was called into a meeting with management and an employee assistance representative and told she was suspected of possessing and/or using controlled substances.
- Sharp denied drug use and consented to a blood and urine drug test; samples were collected in the emergency room without issues with the collection process.
- After the test, Sharp asked to go home and was told she was free to leave but not permitted to drive her car; she was told she would be arrested if she tried to drive.
- Sharp called her boyfriend to pick her up; while waiting, she was kept under one-on-one observation and clinic police officers remained nearby.
- Sharp requested to retrieve belongings from her car; she was not allowed to walk to it and was transported by clinic police car to her vehicle and back.
- When Sharp asked to smoke, she was told to remain within a designated area and was accompanied by a clinic nurse.
- Sharp left with her boyfriend; her drug test was negative.
- Cleveland Clinic later terminated Sharp for performance issues tied to medication-documentation problems.

## Issues

1. Whether the evidence, viewed most favorably to Sharp, could support a false-imprisonment claim based on observation in the emergency-room lobby and transport in a clinic police car.
2. Whether a restriction on driving, coupled with a conditional threat of arrest if Sharp drove, constituted intentional, non-privileged confinement against her consent within a limited area for an appreciable time.

## Decision

- The court of appeals affirmed summary judgment for Cleveland Clinic on Sharp’s false-imprisonment claim.
- The court held the evidence did not show unlawful confinement because Sharp was told she was free to leave and did leave with an alternative driver.
- The court treated the no-driving instruction and conditional arrest warning as safety-related restrictions that did not amount to total deprivation of liberty.
- The court concluded the police-car transport to Sharp’s vehicle occurred to accommodate her request to retrieve belongings and did not itself establish confinement.
- The court found close observation and nearby officers, without physical restraint or a complete bar on leaving the premises, did not create a triable issue of false imprisonment.

## Legal Principles

- False imprisonment requires proof that the defendant intentionally confined the plaintiff, without lawful privilege and against the plaintiff’s consent, within a limited area for an appreciable time.
- Confinement may be shown by force or threats, but restrictions that leave a meaningful ability to depart may be insufficient.
- On summary judgment, the plaintiff must produce evidence from which a reasonable factfinder could find each element of false imprisonment.
- Workplace safety-based restrictions during an investigation may be privileged where they are reasonably connected to preventing harm and do not amount to a complete restraint on leaving.

## Conclusion

The court held that monitored waiting, a prohibition on driving with the option to leave by other means, and police-assisted transport to retrieve items from a car did not constitute the intentional, non-privileged confinement required for false imprisonment, and it affirmed summary judgment for the employer.


Sharp v. Cleveland Clinic, 176 Ohio App. 3d 226, 891 N.E.2d 809 (Ohio Ct. App. 2008)