Case Title: Johnson v. United Parcel Service

Citation: 180 Vt. 513, 2006 VT 57, 904 A.2d 1089

Docket Number: 

State: vermont

Court: Vermont Supreme Court

Date: 2006-06-08T00:00:00Z

Document:
Johnson v. United Parcel Service (2005-047); 180 Vt. 513; 904 A.2d 1089

2006 VT 57

[Filed 08-Jun-2006]

                                 ENTRY ORDER

                                 2006 VT 57

                      SUPREME COURT DOCKET NO. 2005-047

                             FEBRUARY TERM, 2006

  Barbara Johnson                      }         APPEALED FROM:
                                       }
                                       }
       v.                              }         Chittenden Superior Court
                                       }  
  United Parcel Service and            }
  Robert Clark                         }         DOCKET NO. S0124-02 CnC
                                       }

                                                 Trial Judge: Richard W. Norton

             In the above-entitled cause, the Clerk will enter:

       ¶  1.  Defendant United Parcel Service appeals from the superior
  court's denial of its motion for correction of the jury verdict or for a
  new trial, filed pursuant to Vermont Rule of Civil Procedure 59.  Defendant
  claims the court was compelled by Rule 49(b) to recognize an inconsistency
  between the jury's answers to interrogatories and the general verdict.  We
  find no patent inconsistency in the verdict, and conclude that the court
  did not abuse its direction in denying defendant's motion.  We affirm.

       ¶  2.  The underlying case was a personal injury action.  The jury
  found that defendant was liable, but that plaintiff, Barbara Johnson, was
  forty percent comparatively negligent.  The verdict form set forth specific
  questions as to each party's negligence.  The form then asked the jury to
  calculate past and future damages, with separate lines to specify each
  element of damage.  The final blank on the form was marked "Total," and
  required the jury to add the specific amounts of damages.  Neither party
  objected to the final version of the form.

       ¶  3.  The court instructed the jury that two reductions to damages
  should be applied, although not reflected on the verdict form.  The court
  told the jurors that it was their obligation to reduce any award for future
  damages to its present worth.  Plaintiff's counsel had addressed the issue
  of net present value in closing and suggested various ways in which the
  future medical damages could be reduced, but the court instructed the
  jurors that determining an appropriate discount rate was their decision. 
  The court also instructed the jury, "If you find Plaintiff Johnson to have
  been contributorily negligent, and that such negligence did not exceed 50
  percent, and you find damages to have been proved, then you will reduce any
  damage award by the percentage of negligence you have attributed to
  Plaintiff Johnson."  Defendant did not object to the charge with respect to
  the instructions to reduce the damages if awarded.

       ¶  4.  The jury found total damages in the amount of $156,391, which
  was the sum of $8,600 for lost wages, $107,791 for past and future medical
  expenses, $20,000 for pain and suffering, and $20,000 for physical
  impairment.  Neither party wished to poll the jury, and it was discharged. 
  In entering judgment on the verdict, however, the court reduced the total
  damages by the degree of comparative negligence assessed to plaintiff,
  forty percent, and entered judgment in the amount of $93,834.60 plus costs.

       ¶  5.  Plaintiff filed a timely motion to amend the judgment,
  arguing that the court had instructed the jury to reduce the damages to
  account for any comparative negligence, and that the jury should be
  presumed to have followed the instruction.  Defendant opposed the motion,
  arguing that "[t]here appears to be confusion" between the verdict form and
  the court's instructions.  The court offered to recall the jury foreperson
  and ask her whether the jury had already reduced the damages by forty
  percent, but both parties objected to this procedure.  The court granted
  plaintiff's motion and entered an amended judgment in the original amount
  of $156,391 plus costs.
    
       ¶  6.  Defendant then filed its Rule 59 motion to alter or vacate
  the judgment, claiming that the answers to the interrogatories were
  inconsistent with the final verdict under Rule 49(b).  The court denied the
  motion, stating that it instructed the jury to reduce plaintiff's damages
  by the degree of her comparative negligence, that it presumed the jury
  followed this instruction, and that defendant had waived the polling of the
  jury as to whether it followed the court's instruction.

       ¶  7.  Defendant concedes in its reply brief that it can no longer
  challenge the verdict form or the jury instructions, as those issues have
  been waived.  See V.R.C.P. 51(b) ("No party may assign as error the giving
  or the failure to give an instruction unless that party objects thereto
  before the jury retires to consider its verdict, stating distinctly the
  matter objected to and the grounds of the objection.").  It claims instead
  that the jury's answers to interrogatories on the verdict form are patently
  inconsistent with a verdict of $156,391 because that amount represented
  100% of the total damages claimed, and thus, the jury clearly did not
  intend to reduce the verdict by forty percent.  To support its assertion
  that the jury's intent was clear, defendant presents a scenario detailing
  the choices the jury must have made, based in part on plaintiff's counsel's
  suggestions to the jury during his closing argument regarding potential
  discount rates for reducing future damages to net present value.  Defendant
  also argues that because one of the specified elements, lost wages, was
  awarded in the amount of $8,580, which was just under plaintiff's claimed
  lost wages of $8,600, the award must not have been reduced, and the jury
  must not have followed the court's instructions on that point. 

       ¶  8.  Defendant relies on Rule 49(b), which permits the trial court
  to correct a verdict or order a new trial if the answers to interrogatories
  are consistent with each other, but one or more of them is inconsistent
  with the general verdict.  V.R.C.P. 49(b).  It cites our decision in Prouty
  v. Manchester Motors, Inc., 143 Vt. 449, 455,