Florida’s “Impact Rule” and Recovering Non-Economic Mental or Emotional Damages
Florida follows the impact rule when it comes to a plaintiff pursuing non-economic emotional distress type of damages. The impact rule “bars recovery when the plaintiff claims mental or emotional damages but has not sustained any physical impact or contact.” Murphy v. Heritage II Holdings, LLC, 50 Fla.L.Weekly D1300c (Fla. 5th DCA2025) (internal citations omitted).
“A plaintiff who suffers a physical impact may recover emotional distress stemming from the incident during which the impact occurred, and not merely the impact itself.” Murphy, supra, (internal citations omitted). Notably, the physical impact can be slight – “the essence of impact…is that the outside force or substance, no matter how large or small, visible or invisible, and no matter that the effects are not immediately deleterious, touch or enter into the plaintiff’s body.” Murphy, supra (internal citations omitted).
The key to remember is unless you can argue or establish an impact, the impact rule will apply to BAR these non-economic emotional or mental damages. Thus, when asserting a claim, even if the impact is slight, you want to allege and prove the slight impact to trigger these non-economic damages. In Murphy, the plaintiff’s argument was that the plaintiff inhaled harmful smells of raw sewage and smoke from her house due to the defendant’s lack of maintenance and this exposure to hazardous conditions caused her non-economic mental and emotional damages. The appellate court found that the impact rule did not apply. There is authority that inhaling or absorbing harmful substances creates an impact meaning the impact rule would not apply to bar the non-economic emotional or mental damages.
Please contact David Adelstein at dadelstein@gmail.com or (954) 361-4720 if you have questions or would like more information regarding this article. You can follow David Adelstein on Twitter @DavidAdelstein1.
