Judge v. Saltz Plastic Surgery, PC

2014 UT App 144, 330 P.3d 126, 763 Utah Adv. Rep. 70, 42 Media L. Rep. (BNA) 2299, 2014 WL 2885693, 2014 Utah App. LEXIS 148
CourtCourt of Appeals of Utah
DecidedJune 26, 2014
DocketNo. 20120646-CA
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 2014 UT App 144 (Judge v. Saltz Plastic Surgery, PC) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Utah primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Judge v. Saltz Plastic Surgery, PC, 2014 UT App 144, 330 P.3d 126, 763 Utah Adv. Rep. 70, 42 Media L. Rep. (BNA) 2299, 2014 WL 2885693, 2014 Utah App. LEXIS 148 (Utah Ct. App. 2014).

Opinion

Opinion

PEARCE, Judge:

T 1 Conilyn Judge sued her cosmetic surgeon, Dr. Renato Saltz, and his office, Saltz Plastic Surgery, PC, (collectively, Saltz) after they provided photographs of five patients, including Judge, to a television news reporter. The reporter included two photographs depicting Judge before and after her surgery in a news story broadcast on television and posted on the internet. The district court granted summary judgment to Saltz after concluding that Judge could not prevail as a matter of law on her claims of false light, publication of private facts, intrusion upon seclusion, breach of fiduciary duty, and negligent employment and supervision. Judge appeals those summary judgment orders, as well as the denial of her motion to compel discovery. We reverse the summary judgment rulings and remand for further proceedings. We affirm the denial of the motion to compel, except to the extent it sought financial information to support a claim for punitive damages, which we vacate and remand for additional inquiry.

BACKGROUND

2 In 2006, Dr. Saltz performed cosmetic surgery on Judge's breasts and torso. Before undergoing the procedure, Judge signed a consent form that provided:

I consent to be photographed or televised before, during, and after the operation(s) or procedure(s) to be performed, including appropriate portions of my body, for medical, scientific or educational purposes, provided my identity is not revealed by the pictures.1

13 In 2008, a television news reporter contacted Dr. Saltz about participating in a story focused on both the dangers of cosmetic surgery and the importance of properly selecting a cosmetic surgeon. The reporter had already identified a patient (not one of Saltz's) whose surgery had gone poorly. In pursuit of a fair and balanced story, the reporter wanted to interview a patient who had experienced a positive outcome. Because Judge was pleased with her surgery and because she works in public relations, Dr. Saltz asked her if she would be interviewed for the story. Judge agreed.

4 The interview was filmed in Dr. Saltz's office. On the day of the interview, the reporter asked Dr. Saltz to perform a mock physical examination of Judge for the camera. Judge understood this to be "B roll" footage that would be shown as background during the news story. Judge wore a patient gown for this segment but requested that she be filmed at certain angles to help ensure the footage would be appropriate and tasteful.

5 After interviewing Judge and Dr. Saltz, the reporter met with Dr. Saltz's office manager to request "before and after" photographs of Judge and other patients. Later that day, the office manager sent photographs of Judge and four other patients to the reporter. Judge's photographs were tak[130]*130en from the neck down and did not show her face, but revealed her naked body in profile from neck to upper thigh.

T 6 The office manager specifically indicated which photographs were of Judge, writing to the reporter, "Here are Coni's before pictures" and "here are Conti's after pictures." The news organization used Judge's photographs in television broadcasts and in an online story. The organization redacted portions of the photographs for broadcast by superimposing black bars over a portion of Judge's bust and pelvis. During the story, as the "before" image morphed into the "after" image; the reporter identified Judge, stating, "this is Coni before; this is Coni after." When Judge learned that her photographs had been broadcast, she complained, and the news organization excised her pictures from the online version of the story.

17 Judge filed suit, initially naming Dr. Saltz, his office, and the news organization as defendants.2 Her causes of action against the Saltz defendants were false light, publicity of private facts, intrusion upon seclusion, breach of fiduciary duty, and negligent employment and supervision. During discovery, Judge sought evidence from Saltz regarding consent forms signed by other patients whose photographs were given to the reporter, Saltz's annual advertising budget and related documents for each year from 2008 to 2008, and Saltz's "balance sheets and tax returns for the past five years." The district court ruled that these items were irrelevant to Judge's claims and denied her motion to compel their production.

T8 The district court dismissed all of Judge's claims in a series of rulings. Saltz first moved for summary judgment on Judge's false light claim, asserting that Judge had not adequately pleaded special damages. The district court agreed and granted summary judgment to Saltz on that cause of action.

T9 Saltz next moved for summary judgment on Judge's publicity of private facts and intrusion upon seclusion claims. The district court ruled that Judge had not established a prima facie case for publication of private facts. It concluded that Saltz had not publicized a fact, because there was "no evidence to establish that the release of photographs to [the reporter] would necessarily mean that the photographs were substantially certain to be made public through a communication to the public at large." The court also determined that Saltz had not disclosed a private fact about Judge. The court reasoned that Judge had at times worn a bikini in public and thus could not "claim that parts of her body that she hald] left open to the public eye are now private facts." The court further found that Judge had "voluntarily placed these facts before the public and gave the public a legitimate interest in viewing the photographs by appearing on television to inform the public about choosing a good plastic surgeon and by making representations about her surgical results."

T10 The district court also ruled that Judge could not present a prima facie case for intrusion upon seclusion. It concluded that Judge had "consented to the use of her photographs for an educational purpose," that Judge had admitted that the news story had an educational purpose, and that there was "no notation on any [photograph] that would identify" Judge. The district court therefore granted summary judgment to Saltz on the publicity of private facts and intrusion upon seclusion causes of action.

T 11 Saltz then moved for summary judgment on Judge's remaining claims-breach of fiduciary duty and negligent employment and supervision. The district court's order did not directly discuss the elements of these causes of action; rather, the court restated its earlier conclusions that the undisputed evidence showed that Judge had consented to the release of her photographs for educational purposes, that the news story had an educational purpose, that Judge had disclosed her identity by introducing herself to the reporter, and that the photographs showed no more of Judge's body than she had previously "displayed in public while wearing a bikini."

[131]*131{12 Judge appeals the summary judgments on her five causes of action and the denial of her motion to compel discovery.

ISSUES AND STANDARDS OF REVIEW

T 13 Judge contends that the district court erred in granting Saltz's summary judgment motions. On appeal from a district court's summary judgment ruling, we view "the facts and all reasonable inferences drawn therefrom in the light most favorable to the non-moving party" and review the court's "legal conclusions and ultimate grant or denial of summary judgment for correctness." - Orvis v.

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Bluebook (online)
2014 UT App 144, 330 P.3d 126, 763 Utah Adv. Rep. 70, 42 Media L. Rep. (BNA) 2299, 2014 WL 2885693, 2014 Utah App. LEXIS 148, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/judge-v-saltz-plastic-surgery-pc-utahctapp-2014.