The Financial Interest As Legally Protected

It is extremely unlikely that a court would find that the CEO’s interest in avoiding emotional distress is legally protected by the doctrine of trespass to chattels.

With some significant exceptions, courts tend to severely restrict recovery in tort for emotional distress, so it is highly unlikely that a court would regard the CEO’s emotional distress as a harm to an interest that would support a claim of trespass to chattels.

Courts are much more inclined to find a trespass to protect a financial interest. This makes good sense in a market economy where the ability to exclude others from the use of one’s property (one’s factory, cash register, or trademark, for example) can be essential to the effective use of that property to make money.

It is no surprise then that the CompuServe court holds that CompuServe’s financial interest is legally protected.

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