Title: Lang v. Morant

State: delaware

Issuer: Delaware Supreme Court

Document:

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE 
 
DANIELLE M. LANG and JOHN DOE, 
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
)  No.  545, 2003 
 
 
Defendant Below,  
 
) 
 
 
Appellant,  
 
 
)  Court Below:  Superior Court 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
)  of the State of Delaware in 
v. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
)  and for New Castle County 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
RAYMOND MORANT,  
 
 
)  C. A. No. 99C-03-162 
ALICIA MORANT, his wife,  
 
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
 
Plaintiffs Below,  
 
) 
 
 
Appellee. 
 
 
 
) 
 
Submitted:  December 15, 2004 
Decided:  January 13, 2005 
 
Before STEELE, Chief Justice, HOLLAND, and JACOBS, Justices. 
 
 
Upon appeal from the Superior Court.  VACATED and REMANDED. 
 
Louis B. Ferrara (argued) of Ferrara, Haley, Bevis & Solomon, Wilmington, 
Delaware for appellant. 
 
John E. Sullivan (argued), Wilmington, Delaware for appellee. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
STEELE, Chief Justice: 
 
2
 
In this automobile personal-injury action, Danielle Lang, a defendant below, 
appeals from an order of a Superior Court judge that set aside an initial jury verdict 
in her favor and granted a new trial.  The second trial resulted in a jury award of 
$25,000 to Appellee Raymond Morant.  Lang appeals that result as well.  The trial 
judge, in the initial trial, specifically asked the jury to determine as a matter of fact 
whether the person driving Lang’s car had acted as Lang’s agent at the time of the 
accident.  Despite submitting the issue of agency to the jury in the first trial, the 
trial judge then decided to set aside the initial jury verdict and order a new trial on 
two alternative grounds.  First, the trial judge found that Lang so controlled the 
driver’s actions that the negligent driver became her agent as a matter of law.  
Second, the trial judge found sua sponte that several remarks by Lang’s counsel in 
summation had substantially prejudiced Morant’s case.   
We conclude that the trial judge correctly submitted the issue of agency to 
the jury in the first trial and that the evidence did not preponderate so heavily 
against the jury’s finding that no reasonable jury could find that Lang’s driver was 
not acting as her agent at the time of the accident.  We must therefore conclude that 
the trial judge abused her discretion by setting aside the jury’s verdict in the first 
trial.  Moreover, because defense counsel’s comments, although improper, focused 
exclusively on matters apart from the jury’s agency-related findings, we also 
 
3
conclude that the trial judge erred when she overturned the jury’s verdict on that 
basis sua sponte.  Accordingly, we vacate the judgment of the Superior Court 
ordering a new trial, all subsequent rulings, and the second jury verdict.  We 
remand with instructions to reinstate the original jury verdict and to enter judgment 
in favor of Lang.  
I. 
 
In April 1997, Morant drove a car that collided with the car owned by Lang 
and driven by someone she knew only as “Lewis.”  Shortly before the accident, 
Lang, Lewis, and a mutual friend rode to a local fast-food restaurant in New Castle 
County.  After picking up another passenger, they left the restaurant.  Once on the 
highway, Lewis drove Lang’s car into the rear of Morant’s.  After a brief 
conversation with Lewis and Lang, Morant left the scene to call the police.  By the 
time Morant returned, Lewis and the other passengers had fled.  Lang remained, 
but could not provide Lewis’s full name to the investigating officer.    
 
After unsuccessful attempts to identify the driver, Morant filed suit in 
Superior Court against Lang and the pseudonymous Lewis, alleging that Lang had 
negligently entrusted her vehicle to Lewis.  Lang then moved for summary 
judgment.  Recognizing that his complaint might not survive solely on a negligent 
entrustment claim, Morant moved shortly thereafter to amend to add an agency 
theory of liability.  The trial judge denied both motions, citing no reason other than 
 
4
her concern that Lewis remained unidentified and that dismissing Lang would 
leave Morant without a remedy.1 
 
Although she had earlier denied Morant’s motion to amend, to allege an 
agency theory of liability, at the trial the trial judge concluded that the evidence 
presented at trial was consistent with an agency relationship and that to conform to 
that evidence the jury must be instructed on an agency theory.  The jury then 
specifically found no agency relationship and returned a verdict for Lang.  Later, 
Morant moved for a new trial, contending that the jury deliberated without fully 
understanding the principles of agency.  In support of his motion, Morant pointed 
to a jury question on agency sent to the trial judge during deliberations. 
In an August 2001 post-trial order, the trial judge discussed for the first time 
her reasoning for allowing Morant to argue an agency theory and for giving the 
corresponding jury instruction: 
At trial, the agency-related evidence was presented, inevitably, in the 
context of the facts of the case and the earlier ruling I made 
[prohibiting amendment], but the missing driver still had not been 
located in spite of [Lang’s] considerable efforts.  I permitted the 
agency issue to go to the jury under Superior Court Civil Rule 15(b), 
as an amendment to conform to the evidence.  It became clear to me 
during the trial that agency was the critical issue in determining 
liability.  The only testimony presented on the subject at trial was 
from defendant Lang.2   
                                                 
1  
Morant v. Lang, Del. Super., C.A. No. 99C-03-162 (Jan. 5, 2001) (Letter Op.).  The trial 
judge denied Morant’s motion to amend at an earlier hearing.  See Tr. of Civ. Mot., C.A. No. 
99C-03-162 (Dec. 19, 2000), at 15, 19-20.  
2  
Morant v. Lang, Del. Super., C.A. No. 99C-03-162 (Aug. 13, 2001) (ORDER), at 3-4. 
 
5
 
Noting that Lang’s ownership and control of the vehicle and its occupants was 
undisputed, the trial judge apparently reconsidered her earlier rulings and held, 
contrary to the jury’s findings, that the evidence established an agency relationship 
as a matter of law.  She then granted Morant a new trial.3  Still concerned that Lang 
was “entitled to an opportunity to find the missing driver,” however, the trial judge 
declined to direct a verdict in Morant’s favor.4   
Secondarily, the trial judge sua sponte criticized several comments defense 
counsel made in his summation to the jury.5  Because of counsel’s “multiple direct 
comments about the credibility of both [Morant] and his expert physician,” 
subjects that were “central to the claim of damages,” the trial judge found in 
retrospect that the curative instruction she had given, designed to remedy any 
prejudice to Morant, had not accomplished that goal.6  The improper closing 
remarks were, therefore, an alternative basis for granting a new trial. 
                                                 
3  
Id. at 4.   
4  
Id. at 5.   
5  
See id. at 5-6 (quoting trial transcript: “[T]hey are going to tell him to jog two miles?  I 
suggest it is not very credible.  That is what he says under oath looking you guys right in the eye. 
. . . They go to Fitzgerald, that’s got to be the most bogus explanation of why someone saw a 
doctor you are ever going to hear in your life. . . . How can you believe anything he says to you 
when he tells you that[?]”). 
6  
Id. at 6-7.   
 
6
 
By early 2003, neither party had been able to identify Lewis.  In anticipation 
of a second trial, and in light of the trial judge’s most recent determination that the 
first-trial’s evidence established an agency relationship as a matter of law, Morant 
sought summary judgment.  Based upon her August 2001 order, in which she 
found agency to have been established as a matter of law, the trial judge granted 
summary judgment on liability.  Trial on damages alone began in October 2003.  
The jury awarded Morant $25,000.  Lang now appeals the Superior Court’s August 
2001 decision granting a new trial, as well as several other rulings that, given our 
disposition of this appeal, we need not address. 
II.   
A.  The Reasonableness Of The Jury Verdict 
  
Historically, the trial judge’s inherent power to grant a new trial has been 
tempered by the deference given to a jury’s findings.7  A new trial is warranted 
only if the jury's verdict is "clearly the result of passion, prejudice, partiality, or 
corruption,”8 or the evidence “preponderates so heavily against the jury verdict that 
                                                 
7  
Amalfitano v. Baker, 794 A.2d 575, 577 (Del. 2001); DEL. CONST. art. IV, § 11(1)(a) 
(“[O]n appeal from a verdict of a jury, the findings of the jury, if supported by the evidence, shall 
be conclusive.").   
8  
Walker v. Campanelli, 2004 Del. LEXIS 462 (Del. 2004), citing Young v. Frase, 702 
A.2d 1234, 1236 (Del. 1997). 
 
7
a reasonable jury could not have reached the result.”9  We review the grant or 
denial of a new trial for abuse of discretion.10   
 
Lang argues that it was reasonable for the jury to find that the short trip to 
the restaurant did not give rise to the level of control required for a finding of 
agency.  In support of her contention, Lang points to the jury’s clarification request   
during deliberations.  In response, Morant focuses on Lang’s ownership-and-
control testimony and argues that the trial judge’s conclusion that no reasonable 
juror could have so found is supported by the record. 
 
A party injured by the driver of another’s vehicle may recover from the 
owner under a theory of vicarious liability.11  Thus, an owner is liable for the 
negligent operation of the vehicle “by his agent or servant who at the time of the 
accident was engaged in the master’s business or pleasure with the master’s 
knowledge and direction.”12  No principal-agent relationship exists, however, 
where an owner “merely permits [the other] to use the vehicle for the latter’s own 
                                                 
9  
Storey v. Camper, 401 A.2d 458, 465 (Del. 1979). 
10  
See, e.g., Dunn v. Riley, 2004 Del. LEXIS 560, at *3.     
11  
Finkbiner v. Mullins, 532 A.2d 609, 615 (Del. Super. Ct. 1987) (contrasting automobile-
related theories of negligent entrustment and vicarious liability).   
12  
Cox v. Dean, 1994 Del. Super. LEXIS 357, at *8; cf. Fisher v. Novak, 1990 Del. Super. 
LEXIS 205, at *5 (“It is long established that, in general, the owner of an automobile is not liable 
for injuries negligently caused by its operation by one whom the owner has permitted to use the 
vehicle, absent some agency relationship between the owner and the operator.”), citing Smith v. 
Callahan, 144 A. 46 (Del. 1928).   
 
8
purposes.”13  The requisite indicia of agency in the automobile-negligence context 
are ownership and control.14  Although a legal concept, agency depends on the 
presence of factual elements.15  It is thus a question usually reserved to the 
factfinder.16   
In the August 2001 order, the trial judge emphasized Lang’s testimony in 
finding an agency relationship as a matter of law.  She noted the “common 
purpose” that the owner and operator shared in traveling to the restaurant, Lang’s 
presence in the front seat, and her consent to (“Lewis”) picking up another 
passenger.  From this record, the trial judge concluded that, as a matter of law, 
Lang exercised the requisite control to establish a principal-agent relationship. 
                                                 
13  
Cox, 1994 Del. Super. LEXIS 357, at *8; cf. Smith, 144 A. at 50 (“Ordinarily an agent is 
engaged in doing something for the principal’s benefit and in the principal’s stead.”).   
14  
Finkbiner, 532 A.2d at 615; see also RESTATEMENT (SECOND) OF AGENCY § 1(1) (1958) 
[hereinafter RESTATEMENT] (“Agency is the fiduciary relation which results from the 
manifestation of consent by one person to another that the other shall act on his behalf and 
subject to his control, and consent by the other so to act.”). 
15  
RESTATEMENT § 1 cmt. (1)(b).   
16  
See Knerr v. Gilpin, Van Trump & Montgomery, Inc., 1988 Del. Super. LEXIS 138, at *6 
(“[W]hether an agency or other type of relationship exists is an intensely factual one.”); J.E. 
Rhoads & Sons, Inc. v. Ammeraal, Inc., 1988 Del. Super. LEXIS 116, at *58 (“[T]here is a 
question of fact as to whether Ammeraal was the agent of Belting.”); Giangrant v. Richard A. 
Parsons Agency, Inc., 1988 Del. Super. LEXIS 128 (summary judgment denied because question 
of fact existed concerning agency relationship).  Cf. Fisher v. Townsends, Inc., 695 A.2d 53, 59 
(Del. 1997) (noting the “determination [of servant versus independent contractor] is ordinarily 
made by the factfinder. . . .”); Fulton v. Quinn, 1993 Del. Super. LEXIS 11, at *9-10 (“Where 
there is sufficient evidence establishing the requisite right of control, the trier of fact may find 
that the physician is an agent of the hospital and thus impose vicarious liability on the hospital.”).  
 
9
While this conclusion may be reasonable, it is not preordained.  Agents 
necessarily subsume their interests to those of the principal.  Under more common 
agency applications – the relationship between, for example, an employer and 
employee or a parent and subsidiary corporation – the line between self interest 
and the principal’s “business or pleasure,” while often factually subtle, is 
conceptually straightforward.  But outside the commercial or employment context, 
as in the case of a routine social outing, the factfinder is confronted with having to 
sift strictly personal and informal interests of the two persons involved.  The 
weight given to these factors, is fundamentally a question for the trier of fact. 
 
In situations where an owner of a vehicle allows another to drive, it is  not 
indisputably clear that the owner’s presence as a passenger in the vehicle at the 
time of the accident dictates a finding of agency as a matter of law.  We conclude 
that in the circumstances of this case, even given Lang’s uncontroverted testimony, 
a jury could reasonably find that Lang’s “control” over Lewis fell short of an 
uncontestable conclusion that an agency relationship existed.  Where the evidence 
is susceptible to two equally reasonable conclusions, state constitutional policy 
favoring jury determination of the facts and this Court’s precedent both demand a 
jury, rather than a judicial, resolution.  Therefore, we must find that the trial judge 
abused her discretion by setting aside the first jury’s factual findings and verdict. 
 
10
B.  The Prejudicial Effect Of Defense Counsel’s Statements 
The Superior Court also granted a new trial sua sponte, reasoning that 
several credibility-based defense-counsel remarks, although contemporaneously 
disregarded, unfairly prejudiced Morant.  After reviewing defense counsel’s 
closing statements, in accordance with our holding in DeAngelis v. Harrison,17we 
agree that the remarks improperly constituted counsel’s view of witness credibility.  
Counsel, however, directed his comments at Morant’s medical experts and the 
issue of damages, not the issue of the relationship between the driver and Lang.18  
Thus, the factfinder’s crucial liability determination in this case would not have 
been affected by the offending comments.19  Because the first jury found no agency 
relationship, and therefore never had occasion to address damages, it is unlikely 
that Lang’s counsel’s improper comments relating to the issue of damages 
prejudiced Morant.20  Conversely, the trial judge’s decision to set aside the jury 
verdict did fundamentally prejudice Lang.  We therefore find that the trial judge 
abused her discretion by ordering a new trial on this basis sua sponte.   
III.    
 
We are mindful that this litigation is marked by a lengthy and convoluted 
procedural history, and is complicated factually by the driver’s anonymity.  
                                                 
17  
628 A.2d 77 (Del. 1993). 
18  
Id. 
19  
Id. 
20  
Id. 
 
11
Confronted with this confusing scenario, drawn out over a period of four years, we 
can understand the trial judge’s frustration over the parties’ inability to find 
“Lewis.”  Ultimately, however, we must conclude that the trial judge’s original 
instinct to send the agency question to the jury was correct.   
The judgment of the Superior Court ordering a new trial, all subsequent 
rulings, and the second jury verdict are VACATED.  We therefore REMAND 
with instructions to reinstate the original jury verdict and enter judgment for Lang.  
Jurisdiction is not retained.