Opinion ID: 729764
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Medcom I Jury's Count-By-Count Damages Awards

Text: 62 Baxter argues that the jury mistakenly divided the total amount of compensatory damages among the three separate counts, and that this mistake provides an independent basis for affirming the court's ruling vacating the compensatory damage awards. As the district court noted: 63 The special verdict form required the jury to indicate the amount of damages it desired to award under the rule 10b-5 claim, the fraud claim and the breach of contract claim. The next instruction on the special verdict form required the jury to indicate the total compensatory damages award. The jury apparently reasoned that the sum of the separate awards for the three counts must equal the total award. The jury awarded $1,000,000 under rule 10b-5 (Count I), $3,000,000 for common law fraud (Count IV) and $1,725,000 for breach of contract (Count V). The jury awarded total compensatory damages of $5,725,000. Since the court has ordered a new trial on the issue of compensatory damages, issues arising from the jury's allocation of damages among the three counts are moot. 64 (MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER, 6/29/90, 1990 WL 104039 at  15 n.8.) Because this Court has found that the district court erred in ordering a new trial on compensatory damages, the issue is now before us. 65 Baxter argues that the count-by-count awards evidence real confusion by the jury regarding the standards it was supposed to apply in two instances. First, there is no rational explanation for the difference in jury awards on Count IV and Count V, because the jury was instructed that the same benefit of the bargain measure of damages applied to both counts. Baxter believes that the award should have been the same, and to the extent it was different, the Count IV award should have been smaller, because that count (common law fraud) had additional elements and a higher burden of proof than Count V (breach of contract). Second, as the district court noted, MHC relied upon the warranty in the SPA providing that Baxter would pay MHC the amount of any overstatement in the balance sheet. Accordingly, the award must be justified, if at all, by reference to [MHC's] breach of contract claim. (MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER, 6/29/90, 1990 WL 104039 at  13.) Yet the jury awarded MHC $500,000 more on the balance sheet claim than it did on the corresponding count for breach of contract. 66 We recognize that the jury may have been confused by the special verdict form in this regard. In fact, the district court warned counsel prior to submission of the form to the jury that they had agreed upon a confusing special verdict form. This confusion does not require vacating the jury's award of damages, however, because the jury's intent was clear. See Atlantic & Gulf Stevedores, Inc. v. Ellerman Lines, Ltd., 369 U.S. 355, 364 (1962) (Where there is a view of the case that makes the jury's answers to special interrogatories consistent, they must be resolved that way. For a search for one possible view of the case which will make the jury's finding inconsistent results in a collision with the Seventh Amendment.); see also Congregation of the Passion v. Touche Ross & Co., 636 N.E.2d 503, 518-19 (Ill.) (holding damages verdict need not be vacated because of inconsistency in awards between counts when jury's intent was clear and remittitur cured excessiveness), cert. denied, 115 S. Ct. 358 (1994); Churchill v. Norfolk & Western Railway Co., 383 N.E.2d 929, 938 (Ill. 1978) (Verdicts are to be construed liberally and may be amended to conform to the pleadings and evidence contained in the record whenever the intention of the jury is clear.); Anderson v. Smith, 415 N.E.2d 643, 646 (Ill. 1980) (defect in jury verdict may be corrected when the jury's intention is clear). 4 At three times--by actual total, by claim, and by count--the jury indicated an intent to award total damages of $5,725,000. In addition, the jury indicated that the damages amounted to $3,500,000 for the domestic programs claim and $2,225,000 for the balance sheet overstatement. The jury was not confused as to how much damages it was awarding. As the district court noted, [t]he jury apparently reasoned that the sum of the separate awards for the three counts must equal the total award. (MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER, 6/29/90, 1990 WL 104039 at  15 n.8.) These awards have a reasonable basis in the evidence and are not against the weight of evidence. Because the jury's intent is clear, the confusion with regard to the special verdict form does not invalidate the award.