On May 28, 2022, Jose Lopez Canizares was riding his motorcycle when he was involved in an accident and transported to Florida Kendall Hospital. When Canizares arrived, he was cared for by emergency medical technicians (“EMT”) Alex Marcovich and Cole Bouza. During treatment, EMT Marcovich took a photo of Canizares’ leg injury without consent, shared it with other hospital employees, and posted the photo to his Instagram account, tagging EMT Bouza, who was visible in the photo. Bouza reposted the photo to his own social media account.
Three days later, on June 1, 2022, a privacy violation was reported to the hospital and the hospital initiated an investigation. Canizares’ identity was established on June 8, 2022, but it was not until June 21 that Canizares’
family was notified that a photo of him had been taken by hospital staff and posted on social media. This information was reported to Canizares’ father/medical proxy, Jose Fabian Lopez, by the hospital’s Privacy Officer, Mayra Mutaner. Mutaner told Lopez that the post had been deleted and that the EMTs had been retrained and disciplined. At the time this information was provided to Lopez (June 21), Canizares was on life support and Lopez was making the decision whether to discontinue his son’s life support. Two days later, Canizares passed away.
Lopez, as the personal representative of his son’s estate, filed suit against the hospital and the two EMTs (Marcovich and Bouza) individually. The operative complaint alleged claims for intentional infliction of emotional distress and invasion of privacy against Marcovich, negligence against Bouza, and, against the hospital, negligence, intentional infliction of emotional distress and vicarious liability for the actions of its EMTs.
The trial court found that Marcovich’s actions in taking the photo and posting it on social media was not outrageous, and granted summary judgment in favor of Marcovich, but denied the summary judgment motion as to the negligence claims against Bouza.
The Third District Court of Appeals State of Florida stated in its March 4, 2026 Opinion: “It is important to distinguish between the three Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress claims alleged in this case: (1) direct claim against the
Hospital for the privacy officer’s disclosure of the incident to Lopez; (2) direct claim against Marcovich for his actions in taking the photo and posting it on social media; and (3) vicarious claim against the Hospital for Marcovich’s actions.”
Intentional Infliction Of Emotional Distress Claim
“As for EMT Marcovich’s conduct in taking and posting the photo, it is significant to note that the claim for Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress is not made on behalf of Canizares (i.e., the person whose photo was taken and posted). It is instead Canizares’s father, Lopez, who asserts his own claim for Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress based on Marcovich (and the Hospital vicariously) taking and posting the photo … Lopez was not present when EMT Marcovich took the photo or when he posted it on social media, and it is undisputed that he never saw them either (the post was taken down within hours and long before Lopez was notified about the incident).”
“The instant case involves a person who sustained grave injuries, who was in the hospital, and who did eventually pass away from those injuries. However, the photo taken and posted was of a person who was alive, not dead … As even Lopez acknowledges in his brief, there are no cases which extend the Minneola holding [which created an exception to the presence requirement for dead bodies or pictures of dead bodies] to a photo taken of a living person, and we decline the invitation to extend a claim of Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress to encompass such a circumstance. We therefore affirm the trial court’s summary judgment in favor of Marcovich and the Hospital on all claims for Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress.”
Invasion Of Privacy Claim
“[W]e find the allegations fail to provide a basis for an invasion of Lopez’s privacy. First, and as the trial court indicated at the hearing, there is nothing in the photo or social media post which would identify Canizares—neither his name nor his face is shown or revealed by the photo. Even the name of the hospital where the photo was taken is not identified or revealed. We agree with the trial court that Lopez has failed to meet his “heavy burden” of showing his privacy rights were violated by Marcovich’s action in taking and posting a photo of his unidentified son while in the hospital, before he died.”
Vicarious Liability
“[W]e agree with the Hospital that, in reposting Marcovich’s photo on his social media, Bouza was not acting in the course and scope of his employment with the Hospital, and thus, the Hospital cannot be held liable for those actions given the undisputed facts of this case.”
“[W]e hold the trial court properly entered final summary judgment in favor of Kendall Healthcare Group, Ltd. (3D23-2235) and properly entered final summary judgment in favor of Alex Marcovich (3D24-775).”
Source Jose Fabian Lopez, etc., v. Kendall Healthcare Group, LTD., et al., Case No. 3D23-2235.
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