Worth The Read

I wanted to share with everyone one of the practice multiple choice questions I did the other day. I originally planned to reproduce the entire lengthy question here for all of your amusement, but I thought the original author of said question may not be amused by this. Thus, I will give you the gist of the fact pattern below.

It started off as a question where a junior female associate was fired from a law firm. We are told she was terminated in order for one of the senior partners to hire a client's son who had just graduated from a prestigious law school. In order to exact her revenge for the misogynistic behavior of the partner, the female associate used her key to enter the law firm with an accomplice later that evening.

After entering the premises, the recently fired associate and her friend proceeded to break into the partner's private office which also contained a private bathroom. In the bathroom hung a large floor-to-ceiling mirror, which the fired associate and her friend removed and replaced with a two-way mirror. Unknown to the partner, his bathroom was adjacent to a busy sidewalk outside the firm. Outside, the spurned lawyer and her friend placed a window with large curtains, and the facts told me that she did not intend for the public to see the partner. Rather, she only intended for the partner to believe someone had been pulling the curtain back exposing his bathroom rituals.

At this point, I am thinking this has got to be one of the most ridiculous questions I have ever read. I started out thinking about an unlawful termination issue, a trespass issue and how this scenario did not meet the criteria for burglary etc... Now, I am thinking they want me to think about an intentional tort because of the added facts about her intent. Here's where it gets really good.

The next day the partner returns to work, and just happens to bring his adult son with him to see the inside of the building. Heeding the call of nature, the son enters the bathroom and quickly hears some commotion outside due to the curtains having been left open. After a quick examination, the son sees that there is a two way mirror in place and runs to tell his father. Arriving outside on the sidewalk, the son show his father the arrangement and how the entire bathroom is visible to everyone on the street. The partner, who as a cross dresser liked to wear a bra and women's panties beneath his expensive Italian suits, was so affected by the thought that people had seen his preferred undergarments that he abruptly suffered a heart attack.

Wait, what?

Wow...just, wow man. If the goal of the question was to completely throw me off at the end, mission accomplished. The question we were supposed to answer after all of this was, in an action by the partner against the associate for infliction of mental distress, the fact that the son discovered the mirror-window and showed it to his father has what legal effect?

Who cares about that? All I kept thinking was that the nurses and doctors in the emergency room were going to be in for a real treat when they cut this guy's suit off.