Opinion ID: 1434840
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Passion & Prejudice (Issue 1)

Text: The district court did not abuse its discretion by denying defendants' post-verdict motion for a mistrial based on defendants' arguments that the verdict was the result of the passion and prejudice of the jury. We reach this conclusion because the purportedly improper comments made by plaintiffs' counsel were not sufficiently prejudicial. If statements made during the course of closing arguments are improper, then this court may only set aside the verdict if there is a reasonable probability that the verdict was influenced by those arguments. Strickland v. Owens Corning, 142 F.3d 353, 358 (6th Cir.1998) (quotation omitted). Defendants did not object to the purportedly improper statements made by plaintiffs' counsel during closing argument and instead raised this issue for the first time in a post-trial brief that they filed on May 31, 2006. Because defendants failed to object during closing arguments, we require a heightened degree of prejudice in order to grant a new trial. Id.; see also Portis v. Grand Trunk W.R.R. Co., 28 F.3d 1214, 1994 WL 362110, at 3, 1994 U.S.App. LEXIS 17399, at -12 (6th Cir.1994) (reviewing for gross injustice where party failed to object). In the context of the entire closing argument and trial, the comments of plaintiffs' counsel were not sufficiently prejudicial to warrant a new trial. Defendants refer to a number of statements that plaintiffs' counsel made during closing arguments, but do not explain why each statement was improper. From the context of defendants' argument, it appears that they are arguing that some of these statements constituted improper appeals to local bias and that other statements improperly referred to defendants as large corporations. For example, plaintiffs' counsel argued to the jury, This is a joke. They think they can come down here to Nashville, Tennessee, and pull a fast one on the six of you. Plaintiffs' counsel also argued, If it is okay to be looked down on and if it is okay to do what the defendants did, then I guess you have to tell them that. But if it is not okay, if in Nashville, Tennessee, we're not going to put up with that, then it is up to you. You six people today stand for the community that we live in. With respect to punitive damages, plaintiffs' counsel repeatedly asked the jury to tell the world that [what defendants did] is not going to happen in Nashville, Tennessee. Plaintiffs' counsel also, one time, referred to one of the defendants as a multi-million dollar company, and implied that defendants' expert was a fancy guy from New York. Cases relied on by plaintiffs are distinguishable. In Whitehead v. Food Max, 163 F.3d 265, 275-78 (5th Cir.1998), the Fifth Circuit held that counsel's comments that appealed to local bias were prejudicial where counsel also ignored the district court's rulings on objections made by the other party and when considered with other prejudicial comments, including counsel's improper `Golden Rule' argument, and the size of the jury's verdict. In Pingatore v. Montgomery Ward & Co., 419 F.2d 1138, 1142-44 (6th Cir.1969), this court held that a new trial on damages was required when, during closing arguments, plaintiffs' counsel cursed, shouted, tore papers used by opposing counsel, and placed an empty chair before the jury and asked where the defendant corporation was. Here, there is no similar outrageous conduct by plaintiffs' counsel other than the improper references to Nashville and New York. Defendants only point to the fact that the jury deliberated for less than three-and-one-half hours and awarded plaintiffs the same amount of damages that plaintiffs demanded. Together, these considerations do not rise to the level of prejudice that would require a new trial. The district court also did not abuse its discretion by rejecting defendants' argument that the amount of compensatory damages that the jury awarded was not supported by proof, and thus could only have been the product of prejudice, because the jury awarded the same amount of damages that plaintiffs demanded. Plaintiffs asked for $733,878 in damages each for Bridgeport and Westbound, and the jury complied. In a post-trial brief in response to the district court's order requesting briefing on remaining issues of law, plaintiffs stated that Westbound was only entitled to $706,888 because the amount that they asked for and were given by the jury included $28,140 in profits for JCP, to which plaintiffs conceded they were not entitled. [4] But defendants point out that if one were to add the $28,140 that Westbound excluded to the $706,688 that plaintiffs stated in their post-trial brief that Westbound was entitled to, the resulting amount is $734,828, not the $733,878 that plaintiffs requested from the jury. Defendants also argue that the damages award cannot be supported by the testimony of plaintiffs' expert on damages, Dr. Michael Einhorn, who testified at length about defendants' profits and plaintiffs' damages. Dr. Einhorn showed the jury slides that summarized his testimony and prepared an expert report in which he calculated defendants' profits and plaintiffs' damages. According to Dr. Einhorn's testimony, Bridgeport's total damages award should have been $842,688, with interest, and $768,232, without interest, and Westbound's total damages award should have been $758,634, with interest, and $688,523, without interest. To the extent that the jury included compounded, prejudgment interest in the damages award, the award was supported by the evidence, as the award was  without the interest  less than Dr. Einhorn's estimates for both plaintiffs. It strongly appears that the jury did include compounded, prejudgment interest, as discussed separately in Part III.B., infra. Even if the jury did not consider compounded, prejudgment interest in calculating the damages award, the district court did not abuse its discretion. The jury was within a range supported by Dr. Einhorn's testimony, and even defendants' counsel during closing argument stated that Dr. Einhorn's testimony supported a damages award of $800,000. Perhaps the jury was sloppy in calculating a damages award, and perhaps the jury thought that the number plaintiffs argued was the correct amount supported by the evidence, but given that the jury awarded an amount in a range that the evidence supported, and lower than the amount that defendants argued that plaintiffs' evidence supported, no gross injustice occurred.