Opinion ID: 2180005
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Concurrent Proximate Causes

Text: Russells' last argument relates to the trial judge's refusal to give Russell's proposed jury instruction on concurrent cause and single indivisible injury. The record reflects that there was no issue whether K-Mart and the other defendants would be joint tortfeasors if K-Mart were found liable. The record reflects the following exchange between the trial judge and counsel: Kmart counsel: We understand that plaintiffs are in agreement that that [sic] joint tort feasor is established and therefore we don't anticipate putting any direct evidence of that, since there seems to be an agreement by all parties and the court, as I understood Your Honor's comments at he pretrial conference, that that's all done. And so that at the end of the case the jury will be asked to apportion damages, if they find Kmart liable, among  or between the two accidents, and then that's either going to be 50/50 or 1/99 or something in between. The Court: Do you agree with that? Russells' counsel: I think so. In accordance with the but for test, the Superior Court properly instructed the jury that Russell's RSD could have been proximately caused by two different accidents. The jury verdict sheet asked two questions about liability: (1) Have plaintiffs proven by a preponderance of evidence that Kmart [sic] was negligent? If yes, then (2) Have plaintiffs proven by a preponderance of evidence that negligence by Kmart [sic] proximately caused Mrs. Russell to develop Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy? The jury answered the first question in the affirmative and the latter question in the negative. The Russells' single indivisible injury argument is without merit.