Opinion ID: 2610600
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: restricted opening statement

Text: At the trial the court granted a motion by counsel for the plaintiff and ruled that the defense attorney making the second opening statement to the jury had to restrict his statement to a statement of matters not already covered by the first defense attorney. This apparently was done because there was a similarity of interest, to a large extent, between the positions of the two defendants. It would appear, however, that there was also a definite conflict of interest between the two defendants, particularly as to the issue of whether Sander was an employee of the general contractor rather than of Williams at the time of the accident, under the loaned servant doctrine. A review of the record reveals that there were many facts presented at trial, some of which were previewed in the opening statements, which had a bearing, not only on how the accident occurred, but also on the issue of employment. The court's ruling placed the two defense attorneys in the difficult position of having to determine which one would speak to which issues. Had there been complete agreement as to the facts of the case, perhaps no problem would have been presented. However, there was obvious disagreement, particularly as to the evidence relating to the question of employment, with the probable result that neither defense attorney made the opening statement to the jury which he otherwise would have made. In addition, the two defense attorneys no doubt had different methods of representing their respective clients even as to issues upon which they may not have been in direct conflict. Each attorney should have been allowed to try the lawsuit for his client as he saw best. We do not find it necessary to reach the question of whether there may be some situations in which it would be proper for the trial court to impose this type of limitation on opening statements to the jury. We simply hold that under the circumstances of this particular case it was error for the trial court to require the second defense attorney to restrict his opening statement to a statement of matters not already covered by the first defense attorney.