Stephens v. Hudson Valley Knitting Co. — 48 N.Y. St. Rep. 814

Majority

p. 814

Mary E. Stephens, App’lt, v. The Hudson Valley Knitting Company, Resp’t.

(Supreme Court, General Term, Third Department,

Filed November 22, 1892.)

Headnote

Uegligence—Damages.

In an action to recover damages for personal injuries to plaintiff, while in the employ of the defendant, a manufacturing corporation, and caused by the latter’s negligence, it appeared that the injury caused a severe spinal difficulty, wholly incapacitating plaintiff for work for months, and her physician testified that she would never be able to do anything but light work. The. jury rendered a verdict for plaintiff of $5,500, and the court ordered it set aside as excessive, unless plaintiff consented to reduce it to $2,000. Held, that the verdict was not so large as to warrant an inference .that the jury was actuated by improper motives, and it was error to set it aside.

Appeal from an order of special term setting aside as excessive a verdict for plaintiff, and granting a new trial.

The action was brought to recover damages alleged to have been sustained by plaintiff through the falling upon her of a pile of cloth, caused by defendant’s negligence. The verdict was for $5,500, and it was ordered set aside, and a new trial granted, unless the plaintiff stipulated to reduce it to $2,000. The injury resulted in a severe spinal difficulty, which caused her great pain in the head, and incapacitated her for work.

Dr. Peckham, her family physician, testified as to her condition substantially as follows:

He visited her very frequently; he found a laceration on one of the lips, and one tooth broken; he examined her back the day after the injury, and found a contusion of the tissues across the small 'of the back, and evidently a wrench or twist of the spinal ■column; he treated her with electricity and cupping; he made 115 visits; he examined her just before the trial; he found that ;she was suffering from chronic inflammation -about the vertebrae; that there was inflammation of tlje ligament, and he thought the cartilage between the vertebrae was involved.

Early in her illness she was paralyzed; later there was paresis;

p. 815

paresis is the loss of the control of the muscles; it differs from paralysis in that the nerves of sensation in paralysis are also involved ; in the plaintiff’s case only the motor nerves are affected; for the first few months there was ansesthesis across the small of the back, at which point she was paralyzed; at the time of the trial she was not able to stand upon her feet.

When asked as to the probabilities of her recovery, he answered : “ The condition is very much improved now from what it was the first few months; even now under the most favorable circumstances the strength of the back will be lost.

“ Q. What are the probabilities as to her ever being able to get up and walk ? A. I think if she should recover to that degree she could only walk with difficulty and with pain; she maj be able to do light work, but never anything that requires any great exertion.”

Smith & Wellington ( G. B. Wellington, of counsel), for app’lt; William Shaw, (Matthew Hale, of counsel), for resp’t.

In actions for damages for torts it is the well established law of this state that verdicts of juries will not be set. aside for excessiveness, unless the amount is so great as manifestly to show that the jury must have been actuated by passion, partiality, prejudice or corruption. Coleman v. Southwick, 9 Johns., 45 ; Gale v. N. Y. C. & H. R. R. R. Co., 13 Hun, 1 ; Minick v. City of Troy, 19 id., 253; Gale v. N. Y. C. & H. R. R. R., 53 How., 395 ; Whiteman v. Leslie,, 54 id., 495 ; Collins v. A. & S. R. R. Co., 12 Barb., 492 .

While the court may in such cases have the power to reduce the amount of the verdict, and if the prevailing party refuses to accept such reduction, order that the verdict be wholly set aside, yet if it has such power its exercise should be governed by the same principles which control the court in setting aside the verdict as an entirety. I can see nothing in.this case that warrants the inference that the jury was actuated by any improper motives.

This is not a case where there are several causes of action, or where there are separate and distinct items, some of which the court can strike out for error of fact or law, and thus reduce the verdict. Porter v. Dunn, 131 N. Y., 314 ; 43 St. Rep., 193 ; Whitehead v. Kennedy, 69 N. Y., 462 . The case is one of that kind where, if the plaintiff is entitled to recover at all, it is peculiarly the province of the jury to say how much she is entitled to recover; the question of damages in such cases is one which it is. the special duty of the jury to determine, and while the court may reduce a verdict, it seems to me that ordinarily, if the court thinks the verdict is so large as to indicate that the jury was actuated by improper motives, it is better to set the verdict entirely aside and have another jury pass upon it rather than determine itself what the verdict shoukkbe, and thus assume and exercise the functions of a jury, and I find nothing in this case that makes it an exception to what should be the rule in such cases. •

The order appealed from should be reversed, with costs and printing and other disbursements.

Mayham, P. J., and Putnam, J., concur.