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The first of many Barzam WFT?

WTF KaplanPMBR- I'm pretty sure you're answer to this practice question is wrong, and very frankly this question is just bad bad bad all the way around, WTF?

Here's the question (paraphrased slightly cause it's LONG:

J had a cat named M. Cat is worth $500. J's neighbor N hates cat. N saw M in his backyard eating his plant. N called J, told her to come get the cat or he would kill it. J immediately ran over to N's yard to get M. Meanwhile, N loaded shotgun and went outside. J saw N with the shotgun and said "please don't shoot my cat." N said "I'm sick and tired of her eating my plant." N pointed the rifle at the cat, J instinctively dove towards the cat to save her. At the same time N shot the rifle, grazing J's ear and wounding the cat. J was overcome with grief and became emotionally distraught.

J brings suit to recover damages against N. Which of the following causes of action would afford J the maximum recovery?
A. Battery
B. Conversion
C. Trespass to chattels
D. Negligent infliction of emotional distress

Key with the question is that it's asking for the best way for the plaintiff to recover the maximum ammount. Therefore I elminated conversion and tresspass to chattels because the most that the plaintiff would be able to recover for conversion would be $500 (the full value of the cat) and presumably tresspass would be less than conversion. That left me with the choices for battery and negligent infliction of emotional distress. Seriously, WTF, how am I supposed to know based on the facts given which one would be more likely to get the plaintiff more $$? It's literally a wild guess. Based on the fact that plaintiff got SHOT by a RIFLE I picked battery cause that's definitely a harmful and offensive touching and there is definitely actual damage. Furthermore, in order to have a negligent infliction of emotional distress the plaintiff has to have physical manifestations (symptoms) from being put in physical danger (a "near miss" kinda thing). In this case it wasn't a near miss, it was an actual battery and facts only said plaintiff was emotionally distraught, not that she manifested any physical symptoms from being emotionally distraught.

So battery is the correct answer right?

WRONG

Correct answer was negligent infliction of emotional distress. PMBR has ZERO explanation as to why it's not battery. They simply say that NIED would yield more damages than either conversion or chattels because the maximum for conversion is $500 and trespass is less than $500.

SERIOUSLY??? WTF?

Full post as published by [ Useless Dicta ] on June 06, 2009 (boomark / email).