Opinion ID: 1722787
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Effect of Reversal as to Guiter and Van Zetten on Plaintiff's Judgment Against Westfield.

Text: The next issue which we must consider is whether the result which we have reached with respect to the judgment against defendants Van Zetten and Guiter requires that defendant Westfield also be granted a new trial for purposes of seeking a reallocation of causal negligence among the parties. Westfield argues that it does. In Goetzman v. Wichern, 327 N.W.2d 742, 754 (Iowa 1982), we said that plaintiff's contributory negligence shall reduce [plaintiff's recovery] in the proportion that the contributory negligence bears to the total negligence that proximately caused the damages. Id. at 754. Westfield now argues that, as a result of our elimination of Guiter completely from the causally negligent parties and our granting of a new trial to Van Zetten on reduced specifications of negligence, the special verdict of the jury no longer presents an accurate assessment as to proportionate fault. As a result, Westfield asserts that it is also entitled to a new trial where the proportions of causal negligence can be realigned among plaintiff and the remaining defendants, who are Van Zetten and Westfield. The determination of whether plaintiff's judgment against defendant Westfield, an otherwise unsuccessful appellant, should be affected in any way by the reversal obtained on behalf of the two successful appellants raises an issue which we considered in Christensen v. Sheldon, 245 Iowa 674, 686, 63 N.W.2d 892, 899-900 (1954). In that case, we recognized the distinction which exists between those cases where judgments against multiple parties are reversed for errors established by all appellants as to certain issues and cases where judgments are reversed as a result of errors committed against some parties but not against others. We indicated that, in a proper case, the reversal of a judgment against all parties for errors committed against only some parties is permissible. Quoting from 5 C.J.S. Appeal & Error § 1919, at 1420, we stated that this may occur where the cause of action is of such a nature that the rights and issues are interdependent and injustice might result from a reversal as to less than all the parties.  Id. (Emphasis added.) In the Christensen case, we concluded that no valid reason has been presented for a reversal as to all defendants. We reach a similar conclusion in the present case. Although Westfield could conceivably obtain a more favorable result on a retrial, it has failed to establish that any injustice befell it at the original trial as a result of the errors committed against Van Zetten and Guiter. Plaintiff's judgment against Westfield should be affirmed.