Case Name: SEABOARD COAST LINE RAILROAD COMPANY, Petitioner, v. Carolyn HILL, as widow of Lester George Hill, Jr., Respondent
Court: Florida Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1972-11-08
Citations: 270 So. 2d 359
Docket Number: No. 41472
Parties: SEABOARD COAST LINE RAILROAD COMPANY, Petitioner, v. Carolyn HILL, as widow of Lester George Hill, Jr., Respondent.
Judges: ROBERTS, C. J., and ERVIN and ADKINS, JJ., concur.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 270
Pages: 359–363

Head Matter:
SEABOARD COAST LINE RAILROAD COMPANY, Petitioner, v. Carolyn HILL, as widow of Lester George Hill, Jr., Respondent.
No. 41472.
Supreme Court of Florida.
Nov. 8, 1972.
Rehearing Denied Jan. 12, 1973.
Manley P. Caldwell and Arthur E. Barrow of Caldwell, Pacetti, Barrow & Salisbury, Palm Beach, and Charles S. Ausley, Tallahassee, for petitioner.
William Frates, II, of Beverly & Frates, West Palm Beach, for respondent.
Edward S. Corlett, III, of Corlett, Merritt, Killian & Okell, Miami, and A. Frank O’Kelley, of Keen, O’Kelley & Spitz, Tallahassee, for Florida Defense Lawyers Association.
Robert Orseck, of Podhurst, Orseck & Parks, Miami, for Academy of Florida Trial Lawyers, as amici curiae.

Opinion:
BOYD, Justice.
This cause is before us on petition for writ of certiorari to review the decision of the District Court of Appeal, Fourth District, reported at 250 So.2d 311, a decision certified as passing upon a question of great public interest, to-wit:
"Whether or not, in a wrongful death action under Section 768.02, F.S.1969, [F.S.A.], brought by one spouse to collect damages resulting from the wrongful death of the other spouse, evidence (sic) to plaintiff's remarriage is admissible to mitigate damages."
Plaintiff, respondent herein, brought suit against defendant railroad, petitioner herein, for the wrongful death of her husband allegedly due to the negligent operation of defendant's train through a highway crossing in the City of Clewiston, Florida. The jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff and assessed her damages at $220,000.00. Final judgment was entered pursuant to the jury verdict and the defendant appealed.
The District Court reviewed each of the seven points raised by the railroad on appeal and found them to be without merit. The seventh point raised concerned the admissibility of evidence of the widow's remarriage subsequent to the accident. Defendant tendered evidence that the plaintiff had remarried three times subsequent to the death of her first husband and prior to the trial. Objection to the tendered evidence was sustained by the trial court. The District Court affirmed holding in pertinent part as follows:
"The only possible relevance of such evidence would be to the issue of damages. When the damages available to a widow suing for the wrongful death of her husband are properly understood, it appears that evidence of remarriage is irrelevant. The wrongful death act, Section 768.02, F.S.1969, provides, ' . . . In every such action the jury shall give such damages as the party or parties entitled to sue may have sustained by reason of the death of the party killed. . . . ' (Emphasis added.) Under the statute and the case law interpreting it, the widow's recoverable damages are all losses occasioned by her husband's death. See Seaboard Air Line R. Co. v. Martin, Fla.1952, 56 So.2d 509. It, therefore, follows that such damages are not subject to mitigation because their source is the husband's death. Although the hardship imposed upon the widow by her husband's death may be alleviated by a second marriage, the damages flowing from the death of the first husband are in nowise affected. Some support for this conclusion may be found in the case of Florida Cent. & P. R. Co. v. Foxworth, 1899, 41 Fla. 1, 25 So. 338, 348, wherein the Florida Supreme Court held that in estimating a widow's loss of society by reason of the wrongful death of her husband, a jury might consider all the evidence relating to the marital relationship at and prior to the time of death.
i< >jc
"There is another rationale which would support the conclusion that the evidence of remarriage and the benefits flowing therefrom cannot be used to mitigate damages by reason of the wrongful death. It has been held in a number of Florida cases that a wrongdoer cannot diminish his damages by evidence of benefits flowing to the claimant from an independent collateral source. See for example Wadsworth v. Friend, Fla.App. 1967, 201 So.2d 641, wherein the Fourth District held that damages for wrongful death are based on pecuniary loss calculated as of the time of death and that evidence of the amount of funds received from a collateral source after the death of plaintiff's decedent was not admissible to mitigate damages claimed by plaintiff. In that particular case, the plaintiff was a forty-two-year-old woman dependent on her mother who was killed in an automobile accident with the defendant. After the mother's death, the plaintiff's estranged husband paid her $14,800.00 as a settlement in lieu of alimony. Evidence as to the amount of this settlement was held inadmissible for purposes of mitigating the plaintiff's damages for loss of her mother's support.
"In O'Neal v. Ray, Fla.App.1968, 213 So.2d 1, a wrongful death suit by minor children based upon the death of their father, it was held error to admit for purposes of mitigating damages, evidence of the fact that the minors received veteran's and social security benefits by reason of their father's death. See also Frazier v. Ewell Engineering and Contracting Co., Fla.1952, 62 So.2d 51, wherein it was held that a widow's pension of $42.00 per month received on account of her husband's death was not deductible from the value of her lost support consequent on the death of her husband.
"We conclude both on the basis of the nature of damages recoverable under the statute and the collateral source rule that evidence of a subsequent remarriage was inadmissible."
The District Court in its opinion has correctly answered the question certified. In Florida and by the overwhelming weight of authority, evidence of remarriage of the plaintiff prior to trial in a suit for the wrongful death of a spouse is not admissible. We are not here called upon to decide the effect of the new wrongful death act, effective July 1, 1972.
Accordingly, writ of certiorari is discharged.
It is so ordered,
ROBERTS, C. J., and ERVIN and ADKINS, JJ., concur.
DEKLE, J., dissents with opinion.
. Seaboard Coast Line Railroad v. Hill, 250 So.2d 311, 316-317 (Fla.App.4th 1971).
. "Remarriage of surviving spouse, or possibility thereof, as affecting action for wrongful death of deceased spouse", 87 ALR 2d 252 (1963).
. Fla.Session Law, Ch. 72-35 (March 8, 1972): "(c) Evidence of remarriage of the decedent's surviving spouse is admissible."