SCI Tex. Funeral Servs., Inc. v. Nelson

At common law, a decedent's close surviving family members had a quasi-property right in the decedent's remains, supporting the recovery of mental anguish damages for mishandling the corpse.1 Over *541time, we have reviewed our jurisprudence regarding mental anguish damages and limited their recovery. The question here is whether those limitations now require a contractual relationship between the plaintiff and defendant before mental anguish damages can be recovered for mishandling a corpse. We answer no, affirm the judgment of the court of appeals,2 and remand the case to the trial court.

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