Mongoose on the Loose!

Langford v. Shu, 128 S.E.2d 210 (N.C. 1962)

With a whoosh and a screech, a furry object, which plaintiff believed to be an animal, sprang out at her. She jumped back and turned to run. She stumbled into a brick wall, tearing a cartilage in her knee. Plaintiff spent 63 days in the hospital,and incurred medical bills in the sum of $2,219.88.

Plaintiff, Mrs. Langford, sued her neighbor, Mrs. Shu. She had seen the wooden box labeled "Danger, African Mongoose, Live Snake Eater" when she came into the house through the back door, passing through a screened back porch. Langford discussed the box with Shu, who told her it was a mongoose and that it eats snakes and bugs.

Shu had two boys, aged nine and eleven. They overheard the conversation and decided they ought to demonstrate the box, which held a foxtail that flew out of the box by means of a spring.

The court held that Shu was liable for her sons' prank:

To reach any other conclusion would be to ignore the propensities of little boys who, since the memory of a man runneth not to the contrary, have delighted to stampede timorous ladies with snakes, bugs, lizards, mice and other rewarding small creatures which hold no terror for youngsters. It is implicit in this evidence that defendant expected to enjoy the joke on her neighbor as much as the children, and that she participated in the act with them. To say that she should not have expected one of the boys to spring ‘the mongoose‘ on plaintiff would strain credulity.
. . . .

Taken in the light most favorable to the plaintiff the evidence would permit the jury to find that defendant approved and participated in the practical joke her children played on the plaintiff; that defendant knew plaintiff was afraid of snakes and of the contents of the box which defendant had told her contained a mongoose which ate live snakes; that in the exercise of due care defendant could have reasonably foreseen that if a furry object came hurtling from the box toward plaintiff she would become so frightened that she was likely to do herself some bodily harm in headlong flight.