Court Opinion

ID: 3553320
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2016-07-05 23:05:14.295002+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:47:33.165995
License: Public Domain

The instruction as to the deduction to be made in case the jury should think the risk was increased, was clearly and confessedly wrong, inasmuch as they were directed to deduct the amount they thought the premium ought to have been increased, instead of a sum proportionate to their estimate or the increase of the risk. But it is said the verdict shows conclusively that this erroneous rule was not used by the jury in assessing the damages, because they have the full amount of the policy; that no deduction whatever being made, it is certain the rule was not applied; and, therefore, the defendants were not prejudiced, and the verdict should not be set aside. If we were dealing with a pure matter of mathematics, this would be so, undoubtedly. But when we observe that the instruction, in its practical application, required the jury to deduct only one dollar where they should have deducted about two hundred, it seems to me impossible to say that the defendants were not prejudiced. It is not difficult to suppose that a jury might consider one dollar or five dollars as too trifling a sum to be deducted from a verdict of four thousand dollars, when, had they understood the practical effect to be a deduction of two hundred or one thousand dollars, they might have regarded the matter in quite a different light. Upon this ground I am of opinion that the verdict should be set aside, without inquiring whether the mistake, if there was one, comes within the scope and application of Gen. Stats., ch. 157, sec. 2, or not.
FOSTER, C.J., C. C. I entirely concur in all the views expressed by my learned brethren, suggesting, as they have done, that it becomes unnecessary to consider the question of the applicability of ch. 157, sec. 1, Gen. Stats., to the present case; but, for a consideration of that matter, I refer to my opinion in Chamberlain v. New Hampshire Fire Insurance Company, post.
Verdict set aside and a new trial granted. *Page 119