Opinion ID: 2071399
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: multiple-cause instruction

Text: Smith argues that the court erred in refusing to give his proposed jury instructions on multiple causes. Obviously, if the jury was not correctly instructed on causation, this would undermine its special finding on that issue. However, we conclude that the proffered instruction was not warranted by the evidence. Smith's proposed instructions, summarized generally, would have instructed the jury that the defendants' negligence could still be a proximate cause of Smith's damages, even if other risk factors contributed to the failure of the liver. In essence, Smith was requesting a hybrid substantial factor type of instruction. Under certain circumstances, when multiple causes act to produce a single injury or when the active negligence of a third person is also a substantial factor in bringing about the harm, the standard proximate cause instruction may be insufficient. See Reimer v. Surgical Servs. of the Great Plains, 258 Neb. 671, 605 N.W.2d 777 (2000). Under such circumstances, an instruction that a defendant's conduct is a cause of an event if it was a substantial factor in bringing it about is appropriate. Id. The `substantial-factor rule' was developed primarily for cases in which application of the but for rule would allow each defendant to escape responsibility because the conduct of one or more others would have been sufficient to produce the same result. Id. at 677, 605 N.W.2d at 781. However, an instruction based on the substantial-factor rule was not warranted in this case. To establish reversible error from a court's failure to give a requested jury instruction, an appellant has the burden to show that (1) the tendered instruction is a correct statement of the law, (2) the tendered instruction was warranted by the evidence, and (3) the appellant was prejudiced by the court's failure to give the requested instruction. Curry v. Lewis & Clark NRD, 267 Neb. 857, 678 N.W.2d 95 (2004). In this case, Smith did not contend that in the absence of the initial EC flush, the donor liver would have failed. In fact, Smith contends the opposite. This is simply not a case in which liability could never be established under the standard proximate cause instruction; therefore, a substantial factor instruction was unwarranted. Compare Reimer v. Surgical Servs. of the Great Plains, supra . Nor did Smith contend that this was a case in which the jury would be unable to establish to what degree the plaintiff's damages were caused by the negligence of the defendants. Compare Snyder v. Contemporary Obstetrics & Gyn., 258 Neb. 643, 605 N.W.2d 782 (2000). Instead, Smith's theory of the case was that the use of EC caused Smith's donor liver to fail; in fact, Smith's proposed instruction would still have instructed the jury to that effect. But the jury was correctly instructed on proximate causation and that liability would attach if either Spees or CORS was a proximate cause of some damage to Smith. The jury was also properly instructed that [w]here the independent negligence [sic] acts or failures to act of more than one person combine to proximately cause the same single indivisible injury and damage, each such act or failure to act is a proximate cause, and each such person and/or corporation may be held responsible for the entire injury and damage. This is true although some may have been more negligent than others. These instructions on proximate and concurring causation were a correct statement of the law and consistent with the evidence presented at trial. Smith's proposed instructions, including language taken from the substantial-factor rule, were not warranted by the evidence. Smith also assigned that the court erred in submitting a special interrogatory to the jury asking if EC was a proximate cause of Smith's donor liver failure. Smith did not argue in what way the court abused its discretion by submitting the special interrogatory to the jury or how Smith was prejudiced by the submission of the special interrogatory. Errors that are assigned but not argued are not typically addressed by this court, and we have no basis to do so here. See Livingston v. Metropolitan Util. Dist., 269 Neb. 301, 692 N.W.2d 475 (2005).