Opinion ID: 2085710
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Improper Rulings on Evidence.

Text: The defendants contend that it was error for the trial court to refuse to admit into evidence at the trial an admission against interest contained in the following question asked of Fields at an adverse examination: Q. Did you feel that an accident would have happened had you been able to stop your car without skidding on the ice? A. If I had been able to stop it, it wouldn't have happened. This matter was debated in the absence of the jury. Plaintiff's counsel objected with the following observation: It's an `if' question. If he hadn't started out that morning, there would have been no accident. The trial court sustained the objection. Defendants' counsel vigorously opposed the ruling, stating: Let us state on the record we believe we will be materially prejudiced by the Court's ruling in this respect, because the statement offered is on a very material portion of the lawsuit. . . . We want the Court to know at this moment we regard this ruling as a very important one, and to give the Court an opportunity to correct the ruling at a later time, should the Court determine its original ruling is not correct. Will the Court instruct the jury he is reserving ruling? The court responded: I will let my ruling stand. We not only agree with the trial court, but we consider that it would have been error to have overruled the plaintiff's objection. The question assumed the existence of a material fact which had not been proved and was an improper question whether asked in direct examination, cross-examination, or at a previous adverse examination. See McCormick, Evidence (hornbook series), pp. 11, 12, sec. 7; Anno. 100 A. L. R. 1067. The defendants also maintain that it was prejudicial error for the plaintiff to have brought out the fact that the plaintiff was insured by the same company which insure the defendants. The defendants' argument is that since the plaintiff did not have collision insurance on his own automobile, any reference to his own insurer was irrelevant. In the absence of a counterclaim the identity of plaintiff's insurer would normally be immaterial. This would be true even though it was the same insurer who carried the liability on the defendant's automobile and was itself a defendant in the action. However, in the instant case, the defendants' counsel opened the door by interrogating the plaintiff on the question whether the plaintiff had signed a written statement for your insurance company, in which you stated that before the accident you had been going 15 miles an hour. This cross-examination of the plaintiff would suggest that plaintiff had given such statement to a friendly representative, since it was his own insurance company. This interrogation having occurred at the instance of defendants' counsel, it became entirely proper that plaintiff's counsel should subsequently be permitted to ask his client to identify the name of his insurance company in order to dispel the connotation that there was an extra quality of credence to the contents of the statement because it was given to his own carrier. The statement was in fact taken by a hostile source, and plaintiff's counsel was warranted in establishing such fact.