## Facts

- Amber Rose Warrington allegedly negligently drove an automobile near the Waube home and struck and killed Dolores Waube, an infant.
- Susie Waube, Dolores’s mother, was inside the house, frail, watching from a window as her child crossed the highway, and witnessed the collision.
- Susie allegedly suffered immediate fright and shock, became hysterical and prostrated, took to her bed, and died about two weeks later.
- William Waube, as special administrator of Susie’s estate, sought wrongful death damages for Susie’s death, alleging it was caused by the shock of witnessing the child’s death.
- Defendants filed a general demurrer for failure to state a claim; the circuit court overruled it, and defendants appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether a defendant owes a duty to a bystander who is not in personal danger, to avoid causing shock from witnessing negligent injury to another.
2. Whether physical injury (including death) allegedly caused by such shock is compensable in negligence, allowing a wrongful death action if the injured observer dies.

## Decision

- The Wisconsin Supreme Court reversed the order overruling the demurrer and directed that the demurrer be sustained.
- The court held no cause of action exists for shock-induced physical injury to a person who is outside any area of ordinary physical peril and not exposed to risk of bodily harm.
- Because Susie could not have maintained an action had she lived, her estate could not maintain a wrongful death action based on her death.

## Legal Principles

- Negligence liability requires a duty owed to the particular plaintiff; a breach of duty to the directly injured person does not automatically create liability to all observers affected by the event.
- A defendant’s duty generally extends to persons within the zone of physical danger created by the negligent act, not to bystanders who suffer emotional shock from harm to another while themselves safe.
- Claims for physical consequences of fright are limited to situations where the plaintiff’s fright arises from fear for the plaintiff’s own safety (or exposure to imminent bodily harm), not solely from witnessing injury to a third person.
- The duty limitation serves administrability and liability-limiting functions by preventing open-ended recovery for emotional shock suffered by remote observers.

## Conclusion

The court barred recovery for a mother’s death allegedly caused by shock from witnessing the negligent killing of her child because the mother was not personally endangered; absent a duty to protect a bystander outside the zone of danger from such shock, no negligence or wrongful death claim lies.


Waube v. Warrington, 216 Wis. 603, 258 N.W. 497 (Wis. 1935)