Page:McQuay v. Guntharp.pdf/7

472 ''for which damages may be sought must be so severe that no reasonable person could be expected to endure it. It must be reasonable and justified under the circumstances. Liability arises only when the distress is extreme.''

"By extreme and outrageous conduct, we mean conduct that is so outrageous in character, and so extreme in degree, as to go beyond all possible bounds of decency, and to be regarded as atrocious, and utterly intolerable in a civilized society."

Id. at 280, 596 S.W.2d at 687 (citations omitted) (emphasis added). Additionally, in M.B.M. Co., this court cited with approval Professor Prosser's theory that the relationship between the plaintiff and the defendant may give rise to the extreme and outrageous nature of the conduct: "Prof. Prosser states that there are cases in which the extreme and outrageous nature of the conduct arises not so much from what is done as from the abuse by the defendant of a relationshtp with the plaintiff which gives him power to damage the plaintiff's interests."

Id. at 281, 596 S.W.2d at 688 (emphasis added) (citing William L. Prosser, Insult & Outrage, 44 C. L. R. 40 (1956)). Similarly, in Croom, 323 Ark. 95, 913 S.W.2d 283, wherein the plaintiff asserted a claim for outrage based upon sexual acts, this court viewed as important the relationship between the plaintiff, a fifteen-year-old girl, and the defendant, her fifty-one-year-old cousin, holding that "[t]he conclusion that his age and relationship exerted considerable influence over a minor girl is undeniable." Id. at 103, 913 S.W.2d at 287 (emphasis added).

In Jefferson, 225 Ark. 302, 280 S.W.2d 884, the plaintiff, a patron in a local tavern, had filed an action alleging that the defendant, the owner and proprietor of the tavern, had violated his duty of ordinary care in unlawfully injuring the plaintiff. The facts demonstrated that the defendant had shot the plaintiff after the two men had been engaged in an altercation inside the tavern. The complaint alleged that the relationship of proprietor-invitee existed between the parties, and that the defendant-proprietor had attempted to eject plaintiff-invitee from the tavern, using more force than was necessary, causing injury to the plaintiff. On appeal to this court, the defendant argued that the action was really one for assault and battery, and that the trial court had erred