[DO NOT PUBLISH]

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT

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No. 14-12962

Non-Argument Calendar

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D.C. Docket No. 1:10-cv-03044-AT

TOM COOPER,

GAIL COOPER,

Plaintiffs-Appellants,

versus

MARTEN TRANSPORT, LTD.,

DWAYNE STROMAN,

Defendants-Appellees.

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Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of Georgia

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(April 9, 2015)

Before JORDAN, JILL PRYOR, and COX, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

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The Plaintiffs Tom and Gail Cooper sued the Defendants Dwayne Stroman 

(the truck driver) and Marten Transport, Ltd. (his employer), alleging that Stroman 

negligently crashed into the rear of the Plaintiffs’ car. This is a diversity case; 

Georgia law applies. The Plaintiffs sought damages for personal injury. The 

negligence claim was tried to a jury, which rendered a verdict in favor of the

Defendants. The Plaintiffs appeal.

The Plaintiffs present a number of arguments on this appeal. The issues that

warrant discussion, however, boil down to three: (1) that the court erred in denying 

their Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50(a) motion for judgment as a matter of law 

(“JMOL”), which was asserted at the close of the Plaintiffs’ case; (2) that the court 

erred in denying their Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50(b) renewed motion for 

judgment as a matter of law post-trial; and (3) that the jury instructions and the 

verdict form were improper and warrant a new trial.

The Plaintiffs failed to make timely objections to the court’s jury 

instructions or the court’s verdict forms, either before the jury was instructed or

prior to jury deliberations. Thus, any objections to the jury instructions or the 

verdict form were waived. See Farley v. Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co., 197 F.3d 1322, 

1329 (11th Cir. 1999). And, the Plaintiffs neither discuss the elements of any 

“plain error” nor convince us that plain error occurred.

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We turn now to the Plaintiffs’ motions for JMOL. The dispute arises, in 

large part, from conflicting uses of the word “negligence.” The Defendants discuss 

it in terms of all the elements of a negligence claim: (1) duty; (2) breach of duty; 

(3) causation; and (4) damages. The Plaintiffs, instead, use it to describe only the 

breach of duty element. While it is the case that people sometimes use the term 

negligence in the latter sense, we conclude from the record that the district court 

and the jury understood the term negligence on the verdict form in the former 

sense—including all the elements of the negligence claim. 

We consider in sequence the JMOL motions. The first JMOL motion (a 

Rule 50(a) motion) was made at the close of the Plaintiffs’ case, before the 

Defendants had the opportunity to present any evidence. (Trial Transcript, D.E. 

252 at 253–55). The motion for JMOL was characterized as “[a]gainst the defense 

for their argument that degenerative changes can be argued to be the cause of the 

symptoms here.” The court held the motion in abeyance, inviting Plaintiffs’ 

counsel to renew the motion at the conclusion of evidence. The Plaintiffs did not 

renew this motion at the conclusion of the evidence. The motion made at the close 

of the Plaintiffs’ case was not due to be granted before the Defendants had the 

opportunity to present evidence. Thus, we find no error in the court’s failure to 

grant this motion.

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The Plaintiffs’ argument in favor of their post-trial JMOL motion (a Rule

50(b) motion) points to Stroman’s admission that he was at least in part to blame 

for the collision. This admission, Plaintiffs contend, is sufficient evidence to 

entitle them to judgment as a matter of law. The district court rejected this 

argument. The court noted that this admission went to whether Stroman breached 

a duty of care, and, that proof that Stroman’s conduct was the proximate cause of 

injuries suffered was also required. The district court then inferred that “the jury 

was unconvinced that the collision was the proximate cause of any of the 

Plaintiffs’ alleged injuries.” And, concluding that proximate cause was properly a 

question for the jury, the district court denied the Plaintiffs’ JMOL motion.

We need not decide this issue. A Rule 50 motion is only a renewal motion, 

and may only be grounded on arguments advanced in the pre-verdict motion. The 

pre-verdict motion was not grounded on Stroman’s admission of fault. And, for 

the reasons discussed above, the district court did not err in denying the Plaintiffs’ 

pre-verdict motion. For these reasons, the Plaintiffs’ Rule 50(b) motion was 

properly denied.

Because the Plaintiffs were not entitled to judgment as a matter of law

before the Defendants had the opportunity to present evidence, because the other 

issues raised by the Plaintiffs were not properly preserved, and for the other 

reasons stated in this opinion, the judgment of the district court is affirmed.

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AFFIRMED.

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