Opinion ID: 1713202
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The State's Motion to Consolidate.

Text: We have also granted the defendants' application for interlocutory review of the district court's denial of the State's motion to consolidate the two cases pending in Dubuque and Chickasaw Counties. Defendants joined with the State in requesting consolidation and a single trial in Dubuque County, contending that the two lawsuits evolved from the same series of events, involved nearly identical evidence, witnesses, parties, claims, and cross-claims, and presented common questions of law and fact. They argued that consolidation of the actions would avoid unnecessary litigation, costs and delay, and ... promote the interest of justice. The plaintiffs in the Dubuque County action resisted the motion to consolidate but in the alternative asked that a consolidated trial be held in Dubuque County. Rochford, plaintiff in the Chickasaw County lawsuit, resisted the motion to consolidate but in the alternative requested that a consolidated trial be held in Chickasaw County. No party resisting consolidation contended that cases filed in different counties could not be consolidated. In denying the motion to consolidate, the district court wrote: [T]he issues involved in the above-entitled cause are sufficiently complex that the addition of an entirely new action, although arising out of the same accident, would create a source of confusion for the jury and an intolerable burden for the trial court in determining an equitable method of determining order of precedence, number of strikes and instructions to the jury. We have long given trial courts considerable discretion to determine whether two or more actions should be consolidated for trial pursuant to Iowa Rule of Civil Procedure 185. See Schupbach v. Schuknecht, 204 N.W.2d 918, 920-21 (Iowa 1973); Liberty Loan Corp. v. Williams, 201 N.W.2d 462, 464 (Iowa 1972); Hamdorf v. Corrie, 251 Iowa 896, 901-02, 101 N.W.2d 836, 839-40 (1960). We emphasize, however, that the modern and enlightened trend is to combine in one action for trial all claims and actions involving several persons injured in a single incident even though there may be differences in the rules of law applicable to the parties as drivers or passengers or differences in testimony and instructions relating to damages. 2 Vestal & Willson, Iowa Practice § 34.04, at 17 (1984); Annot., 68 A.L.R.2d 1372, 1378 (1959 & Supp.1984). These two cases certainly appear to have sufficient similarity of parties, claims and issues to warrant consolidation for trial. We need not in this case, however, decide whether the trial court abused its discretion in denying consolidation. The trial court may well have considered as an important factor in its denial of consolidation the ruling it made at the same time dismissing the defendants' cross-petition against the State. The result of that ruling was that the State was a third-party defendant in one of the two lawsuits but not the other. Our reversal of that ruling changes the circumstances relevant to the issue whether the two cases should be consolidated. On remand the district court should take a fresh look at the motion to consolidate now that the State is once again a third-party defendant in both actions, deciding whether the two cases should now be consolidated and tried together either in the district court for Dubuque County or the district court for Chickasaw County. REVERSED AND REMANDED WITH DIRECTIONS.