Opinion ID: 2535879
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Did the trial court's judgment violate the doctrine of the law of the case?

Text: ¶ 8. The question presented by the City is somewhat unwieldy: Whether the lower court erred in failing to limit damages to those from the fall on the curb. The City argues that this award violates the doctrine of the law of the case: Whatever is once established as the controlling legal rule of decision, between the same parties in the same case, continues to be the law of the case, so long as there is a similarity of facts. [9] And the judgment of the trial court was, at least rhetorically, limited to damages caused by the fall. The opinion order said: [Dr. Hayne] testified that ... it was his opinion ... that the condition and treatment reflected by the medical records of Mrs. Stewart[ ] were causally related to the plaintiff hitting her head on pavement when she fell on August 11, 1997. He also testified that the plaintiff's striking her head injured her brain and led to the continuous decline of her cognitive and physical abilities until her death on November 4, 2002.... The Court finds Dr. Hayne's testimony credible on the issue of liability and damages. Our instructions were merely that because any stroke was not a foreseeable result of the fall, injuries resulting from that stroke ought not be considered in calculating damages. [10] ¶ 9. The plaintiffs failed under their old logic (a fall caused a stroke which caused various other maladies) because the stroke was not foreseeable. They have crafted a new logic: a fall caused a traumatic brain injury which caused various other maladies. Our prior decision certainly did not suggest that traumatic brain injuries are unforeseeable results of head injuries, so their new theory does not violate any law of the case. Essentially, the City asks whether the trial judge ought to have given credence to a new theory about whether their negligence caused much of Mrs. Stewart's sickness and suffering in her final years. We interpret this as a challenge to the overwhelming weight of the evidence.