Opinion ID: 2377626
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Attorney misconduct resulting in excessive verdict

Text: New Prospect cites numerous examples of alleged attorney misconduct that it argues led to the verdict of $3 million, which it considers to be excessive. First, New Prospect complains about the opening statement of Mr. Peel in which he referred to the fact that the members of Ms. Jones's family had not reached closure with respect to the death of their seventeen-year-old daughter and sister and that they had to deal with her death at the funeral and after. New Prospect suggests that, in conjunction with later references by witnesses to the fact that the case had been tried once before, the opening-statement language suggested New Prospect was somehow at fault for delay. There were indeed some references by witnesses to the earlier trial. Most of them seemed to be inadvertent. From the record before us, we cannot say that the references created any prejudice toward New Prospect. The second misconduct argument has to do with Mr. Peel's questioning of Don Johnston, who testified as an expert on behalf of New Prospect. On several occasions after Mr. Johnston made a statement on cross-examination, Mr. Peel asked if the jury was to just take [his] word for the truth of the statement. New Prospect attempted to inquire of Mr. Johnston whether Mr. Peel had asked that he serve as an expert for First Commercial in the case and thus to prove that Mr. Peel was questioning the trustworthiness of a witness he had previously attempted to procure for his client. The Trial Court refused to allow it on the ground that Mr. Peel would have to become a witness to refute any such evidence and that that would not be permitted. See Model Rule of Professional Conduct 3.7. New Prospect has not demonstrated that ruling to have been in error. We do not mention all of New Prospect's allegations of misconduct, but there are two others we choose to discuss that were raised in New Prospect's motion for a new trial. First Commercial contends that Mr. Peel, at one point during the trial, said something like, Those damn defense lawyers will argue with a wall all day long. The contention is that it was said in such a manner as to be audible to the jurors. Mr. Peel, in response, argued at trial that he did not use the word damn and that his remark was not overheard by the jury. Finally, and perhaps most serious, there is a contention that Mr. Peel improperly appealed to the sympathy of the jurors in his closing argument. After Mr. Angel, arguing for New Prospect, had reminded the jurors of the Trial Court's instruction not to allow sympathy to enter their verdict, Mr. Peel, in rebuttal, agreed with that position but said, ... in cases like this if you measure a tremendous loss, you can't help but have some sympathy for them. You can't separate the two. Defense counsel's objection was sustained. In support of its argument that the jury's verdict was affected by these instances of misconduct, New Prospect cites this language: If the transgression be flagrantif the offensive remark has stricken deep, and is of such a character that neither rebuke nor retraction can entirely destroy its sinister influencea new trial should be promptly awarded.... German-American Ins. Co. v. Harper, 70 Ark. 305, 307-08, 67 S.W. 755, 756 (1902). It is our view of the case that the instances of alleged misconduct on the part of Mr. Peel were not of the sort described in the quoted standard. Nor was it a situation such as we confronted in Alexander v. Chapman, 289 Ark. 238, 711 S.W.2d 765 (1986), where it appeared that counsel ran roughshod over the Trial Court's rulings. The responses of the Trial Court to the objections and the new trial motion were within the Trial Court's discretion, and we have not been given sufficient reasons to reverse on the basis of counsel's misconduct.