Weddle v. Life Insurance Company of North America

Filing 36

Judge Richard G. Stearns: ORDER entered granting 15 Motion to Dismiss; adopting Report and Recommendations re 34 Report and Recommendations. (Zierk, Marsha)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS
CIVIL ACTION NO. 17-12372-RGS
PAMELA WEDDLE
v.
LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY OF NORTH AMERICA
ORDER ON REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION
OF THE MAGISTRATE JUDGE
May 25, 2018
STEARNS, D.J.
Whether the claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress is a
common-law claim or one arising out of ERISA, the result is the same (I tend
to think the latter, but I also agree with the former). Therefore the court
agrees

with

the

Magistrate

Judge’s

Recommendation, which it adopts.1

well-reasoned

Report

and

Count III is DISMISSED, and

consequently, there is no cognizable jury claim.

1 I have reviewed the Objections filed to the Report and
Recommendation filed on May 23, 2018. The accompanying memorandum,
while well-constructed, offers no argument that was not laid out before the
Magistrate Judge. On the issue of intentional infliction of emotional distress,
the plaintiff’s own recitation of the facts describes a regrettable exercise of
bureaucratic ineptitude, but no evidence or allegation of the kind of
deliberate torment inflicted in Agis, the seminal Massachusetts case on
which plaintiff relies, or even that described in Emerson, which plaintiff
1

As previously ordered, the parties shall file an agreed upon record for
judicial review by July 31, 2018. If the parties file only a partial record
because of a disagreement over its contents, they must file a memorandum
by August 14, 2018, concerning the additional material that they want
included, with any request for an entitlement to discovery also filed by
August 14, 2018. If no disagreements or requests are filed, motions for
judgment on the record must be filed by August 31, 2018. If there is a
disagreement, dispositive motions are due thirty days from the court's
response to the August 14, 2018 filings - with opposition 28 days thereafter.
SO ORDERED.
/s/ Richard G. Stearns
__________________________
UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

concedes fell short of “appalling” or “profoundly shocking” standard set out
in cases like Foley v. Polaroid Corp., 400 Mass 82, 89 (1987) and Conway v.
Smerling, 37 Mass. App. Ct. 1, 8 (1994).
2