Opinion ID: 2025929
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: joint or successive liability

Text: Before reaching the other issues before us, we must cross a threshold hurdle first erected by the City and now positioned by Burke. Although this case was tried on a theory of joint and several liability, the City argued in a post-trial motion, and again before the appellate court, that it was a successive tortfeasor, and should thus be liable for only its proportionate share of the damages. In responding to the City's motion, Burke, on the other hand, argued that the jury was properly instructed to find joint and several liability. The appellate court correctly found that, where the City's position before that court was inconsistent with its stance in an earlier court proceeding, the City had waived its right to complain of an error in the jury instructions. (209 Ill.App.3d at 201, 154 Ill.Dec. 80, 568 N.E.2d 80; see Auton v. Logan Landfill, Inc. (1984), 105 Ill.2d 537, 543, 86 Ill.Dec. 438, 475 N.E.2d 817.) Now Burke argues before this court that the defendants were successive tortfeasors, while the City maintains that it and Rothschild's acted jointly. We deem the argument to be waived by Burke as well as by the City. However, as this court has previously noted, the waiver rule exists as an admonition to litigants rather than as a limitation upon the jurisdiction of the reviewing court. ( American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees, Council 31 v. County of Cook (1991), 145 Ill.2d 475, 480, 164 Ill.Dec. 904, 584 N.E.2d 116.) Thus we shall address the issue briefly in order to reaffirm and clarify Illinois law. Plaintiff argues that separate acts of misconduct by the defendants at wholly separate times demonstrate that the City was a successive tortfeasor. To support his theory, plaintiff cites Gertz v. Campbell (1973), 55 Ill.2d 84, 302 N.E.2d 40. In Gertz, the plaintiff suffered a broken leg due to the negligent driving of a motorist. The defendant motorist then alleged in a third-party complaint that the treating physician's negligence in delaying surgery led to the necessity of amputating plaintiff's leg. Thus, the motorist asked for indemnity and judgment against the physician for the damages caused by the new injury and aggravation of the original injury. In determining that the motorist and the physician were not joint tortfeasors, the court considered, inter alia, that neither had control over the acts of the other, that different duties were owed the plaintiff by each defendant, and that the injuries were sustained at different times. ( Gertz, 55 Ill.2d at 89, 302 N.E.2d 40.) However, inherent to the Gertz analysis was the recognition that the plaintiff's original injurya broken legcould be distinguished from the physician's aggravation of that injury, which resulted in amputation of the leg. These were separate and distinct injuries, for which defendants could not be held jointly liable. Before the Contribution Act (Ill.Rev.Stat. 1989, ch. 70, par. 301 et seq. ) went into effect as to causes of action arising on or after March 1, 1978, contribution judgments were not available to joint tortfeasors. ( Verson Allsteel Press v. Major Spring & Manufacturing Co. (1982), 105 Ill.App.3d 419, 61 Ill.Dec. 303, 434 N.E.2d 456.) Where a second tortfeasor had inflicted an injury successive to the one caused by the original tortfeasor, courts focused upon the severability of the injury when granting partial indemnity. ( Mayhew Steel Products, Inc. v. Hirschfelder (1986), 150 Ill.App.3d 328, 330, 103 Ill.Dec. 587, 501 N.E.2d 904.) However, where defendants, albeit sharing no common purpose or duty, and failing to act in concert, nevertheless acted concurrently to produce an indivisible injury to the plaintiff, courts found them to be joint tortfeasors. See, e.g., Erickson v. Gilden (1979), 76 Ill. App.3d 218, 31 Ill.Dec. 758, 394 N.E.2d 1076. The test of jointness is indivisibility of the injury. ( Storen v. City of Chicago (1940), 373 Ill. 530, 533, 27 N.E.2d 53.) Section 433A of the Restatement (Second) of Torts states: (1) Damages for harm are to be apportioned among two or more causes where (a) there are distinct harms, or (b) there is a reasonable basis for determining the contribution of each cause to a single harm. (2) Damages for any other harm cannot be apportioned among two or more causes. (Restatement (Second) of Torts § 433A (1965).) The comment to subsection (2) explains: Certain kinds of harm, by their very nature, are normally incapable of any logical, reasonable, or practical division.    By far the greater number of personal injuries, and of harms to tangible property, are    single and indivisible. Where two or more causes combine to produce such a single result, incapable of division on any logical or reasonable basis, and each is a substantial factor in bringing about the harm, the courts have refused to make an arbitrary apportionment for its own sake, and each of the causes is charged with responsibility for the entire harm. Restatement (Second) of Torts § 433A, Comment i, at 439-40 (1965). In the case sub judice, it is incontestable that Burke was injured due to Rothschild's negligence. It is equally indisputable that Burke's injury was exacerbated and or that he received an additional injury through his subsequent mishandling by the City's employees. There was no clear medical evidence to show either that Burke's irreversible quadriplegia came about solely through negligence of Rothschild's or that the paralysis caused by behavior of Rothschild's was a temporary condition capable of reversal absent the City's misconduct. Either injury or both injuries could have caused plaintiff's lasting condition. Burke's quadriplegia was an indivisible harm. Consequently, we agree that the trial court properly found Rothschild's and the City jointly liable to plaintiff.