Case Title: State v. Ward

Citation: 306 So. 2d 265

Docket Number: 

State: alabama

Court: Alabama Supreme Court

Date: 1975-01-09T00:00:00Z

Document:
306 So. 2d 265 (1975)
STATE of Alabama
v.
Elden H. WARD and Vernell Ward.
SC 866.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
January 9, 1975.
William S. Halsey, Anniston, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State of Alabama.
James S. Hubbard, Anniston, for appellees.
BLOODWORTH, Justice.
State of Alabama appeals from the ruling of the trial court denying its motion for new trial after verdict and judgment awarding landowners $49,000 damages in a suit to condemn a portion of their lands for highway purposes. We affirm.
A service station and residence were located on the land in question. The only issue submitted to the jury was the amount of damages to be awarded the landowners for that portion of their lands taken.
Although the State has made ten assignments of error (one of which complains *266 of the overruling of its motion for new trial), its appeal is taken from the adverse ruling on motion for new trial. We are therefore limited in our review solely to those rulings complained of and which are contained in grounds of the motion for new trial. This Court has long been committed to the rule:
Thus, we proceed to consider the grounds of the motion for new trial.
*267 In the first ground, the State complains of the court's "refusal" to grant a written request by the jury to review the testimony of State's witness Towns. We have examined the transcript of the evidence and fail to find any "refusal" by the trial court to grant such request. In fact, the record of the trial is silent as to any request. It does appear in the record that, at the hearing on motion for new trial, counsel for the State called as a witness the foreman of the jury, which sat on the case. When he was asked if he had prepared such a request, he replied that he had, but that the jury went ahead, discussed, and settled this matter before the request was ever transmitted from the jury to the trial judge.
It is obvious that since no request was made of the trial court to review witness Town's testimony, no ruling of the trial court was invoked. It should be self-evident that, in these circumstances, this could not constitute reversible error. Wilbanks v. State, 289 Ala. 171, 266 So. 2d 632 (1972).
The remaining grounds of the motion (2-7) relate to evidentiary rulings by the trial judge. They charge error by the trial court in sustaining objections by the landowners to questions propounded to state's witness Towns as to the consideration paid for allegedly "comparable" sales No. 1, No. 2, and No. 3. Since we agree with appellees-landowners that there is no reference whatever in the record to the court's ruling on an objection to a question as to "comparable" sale No. 2 (grounds 3 and 6), we pretermit discussion thereof.
We now address ourselves to the remaining grounds of the motion for new trial (2, 4, 5 and 7) which complain of the trial judge's sustaining objections to questions as to the consideration paid for comparable sales No. 1 and No. 3.
It was stipulated by the parties at trial that the sole issue to be submitted to the jury "is the amount of damages" to be awarded the landowners.
No ground of the motion for new trial averred that the damages awarded were excessive.
The rule of our cases in such instances is found in our recent case of Mims v. Mississippi Power Company, 282 Ala. 90, 209 So. 2d 375 (1968), viz.:
Since the sole issue submitted to the jury was the question of damages, and the motion for new trial contained no ground charging that the damages awarded were excessive, and since the remaining grounds of the motion (2, 4, 5, and 7) charge error in rulings on evidence as to damages, we hold, in accord with our case law, that cause for reversal is not made to appear in the remaining grounds of the motion for new trial. Mims v. Mississippi Power Company, supra.
In condemnation cases, it is the rule of our decisions that when the jury has viewed the premises (as it did here), "it is not bound by the estimate of damages given by expert testimony." Whitman v. Housing Authority of City of Elba, 272 Ala. 245, 130 So. 2d 362 (1961); State v. Carter, 267 Ala. 347, 101 So. 2d 550 (1958). The landowners contend therefore that errors, if any, in the trial court's rulings amount to "harmless error" under Supreme Court Rule 45. In view of the result we reach, we need not consider this contention.
It is therefore that we must affirm the judgment of the trial court denying appellant a new trial.
Affirmed.
HEFLIN, C. J., and MERRILL, HARWOOD, MADDOX, McCALL, FAULKNER and JONES, JJ., concur.
COLEMAN, J., dissents.
COLEMAN, Justice (dissenting):
I dissent for reasons stated in my dissenting opinion in State v. Dunlap, 279 Ala. 418, 186 So. 2d 132; State v. Graf, 280 Ala. 71, 189 So. 2d 912.