Case Title: Marks v. State Road Department

Citation: 69 So. 2d 771

Docket Number: 

State: florida

Court: Florida Supreme Court

Date: 1954-01-05T00:00:00Z

Document:
69 So. 2d 771 (1954)
MARKS et al.
v.
STATE ROAD DEPARTMENT.

Supreme Court of Florida. Division B.
January 5, 1954.
Rehearing Denied February 9, 1954.
Kenneth A. White, Pensacola, for A.J. Burks and Dollie Burks.
Coe & Coe, Pensacola, for Henry Handrop and Irene Handrop, his wife.
Ross H. Stanton, Jr., Tallahassee, for appellee.
DREW, Justice.
We have carefully considered the questions presented on appeal by all of the appellants. With the exception of the question relating to the proposition of whether the verdicts rendered in the lower court were quotient verdicts, we find no merit in any of them.
The matter being considered by the court and jury below was the condemnation of land for rights of way for a State Road. Many defendants and numerous parcels of land were involved.
*772 The jury returned verdicts for the various parcels of land in odd figures. As an example, for parcel 241 the value was fixed at $1,999.03; for parcel 68, $2,681.66; for parcel 254, $1,948.33. When the verdict was delivered to the Clerk in open court and read by him, the presiding Judge, realizing from the odd figures used in the verdict that it might be a quotient verdict, examined the jury then and there (before their discharge) on the subject. The following events transpired:
Quotient verdicts are universally condemned. To constitute a quotient verdict, however, it is essential that there be a preliminary agreement or understanding among the jurors that each will select a figure as representing his opinion of value or damage and that the sum of said amounts divided by the number of jurors will be accepted by each as his or her verdict, and is in fact so accepted. It requires no citation of authority or long dissertation to establish the invalidity of such a verdict or the mischief that would result from a recognition of it. Such verdict would not represent the independent opinion of each juror as the law requires. On the other hand, the courts recognize that compromise, discussions and deliberations are necessary for the determination of questions where minds differ. The use of such figures solely for the purpose of discussion and deliberation is not improper. Orange Belt Ry. Co. v. Craver, 32 Fla. 28, 13 So. 444.
Attached to the motion for new trial in this cause was an affidavit of the juror Humphries reading as follows:
Appellants argue that it was error for the lower court to refuse consideration of the evidence of the juror in the determination of the motion for new trial. They say that such evidence is clearly admissible to establish the fact that the verdict was a quotient verdict under the authority of Orange Belt Ry. Co. v. Craver, supra, and quote extensively from that case. That case is not authority for the proposition that a juror may testify for the purpose of impeaching his verdict or that his affidavit is admissible for that purpose. It is true that the juror in that case  after first being denied the right to testify  was allowed to do so  without objection  when he was recalled. The case was disposed of by this Court with the specific observation that "we have so considered it [the testimony of the juror] because no objection to it seems to have been insisted on at the time it was offered."
The question of the admissibility of affidavits or evidence of jurors to impeach their verdicts has been a most troublesome one. Professor Wigmore, in his eminent work on Evidence, Vol. VIII (3rd Ed.), pages 684-685, observed:
See also Wigmore on Evidence, Vol. VIII (3rd Ed.), pages 664-712, for the further history and development of the law on this question.
A better rule, according to Wigmore, is outlined by Justice Brewer in Perry v. Bailey, 12 Kan. 539, 544, which is quoted extensively and approved by this Court in City of Miami v. Bopp, 117 Fla. 532, 158 So. 89, 97 A.L.R. 1035.
The Supreme Court of Iowa laid down what is conceived to be the true rule in the case of Wright v. Illinois & Mississippi Telegraph Co., 20 Iowa 195, 210. In view of the full discussion of the subject and what we hold to be the sound conclusion reached here, we quote from the opinion:
Whether the lower court erred in refusing to entertain the evidence of the juror, it seems to us, is not really an issue at all. In the first place, we are completely satisfied from the record before us that the verdict was not a quotient verdict. What a quotient verdict consists of was fully and completely explained to the jury when they turned in their verdict, while they were yet in the court room and a part of the machinery for the administration of justice. Each juror separately affirmed as such juror, in the presence of the Court and counsel then assembled, that it was his verdict, constituted his considered judgment and was not a quotient verdict. If any party to the cause was yet in doubt he should have then and there pursued the matter further. All of the jury was there and every opportunity was presented to determine the facts at that time. When, before a jury is discharged or its verdict accepted and ordered recorded, a question is raised concerning any matter occurring during the trial or in the jury room which does not essentially inhere in the verdict itself, and proper inquiry is then conducted by the trial Judge or under his direction on such question, and determined by him, the same matter may not thereafter be raised by affidavit or otherwise. Any other rule would result in unnecessarily harassing jurors and hampering the effectual administration of justice. Moreover, we can imagine no better time and place to decide the question with the greatest accuracy than at a time when all events are fresh in the minds of the jury and all interested parties are present. See Wigmore on Evidence, Vol. VIII (3rd Ed.) 678, Section 2350.
Affirmed.
ROBERTS, C.J., and THOMAS and HOBSON, JJ., concur.