Court Opinion

ID: 9552756
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 19:16:09.328776+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:28:52.498961
License: Public Domain

HOWE, Justice
(concurring and dissenting):
I concur except in Part II, D, dealing with damages for mental anguish. I cannot subscribe to the reduction by the majority of these damages from $25,000 to $12,500.
In the first place, the plaintiff does not contend that $25,000 is excessive. It urges only that damages for mental anguish should not be allowed under the facts of this case. However, Jeppsen v. Jensen, 47 Utah 536, 155 P. 429 (1916), and Samms v. Eccles, 11 Utah 2d 289, 358 P.2d 344 (1961), seem to provide authority for the trial court’s award although I recognize that in those cases the conduct of the defendant was much more egregious than in the instant case. Secondly, this Court usually does not reduce an award of damages unless it finds them to have been given under *601“passion and prejudice” by the jury or court below. This was made clear in Pauly v. McCarthy, 109 Utah 431, 184 P.2d 123 (1947), where this Court said:
Where we can say, as a matter of law, that the verdict was so excessive as to appear to have been given under the influence of passion or prejudice, and the trial court abused its discretion or acted arbitrarily or capriciously in denying a motion for a new trial, we order the verdict set aside and a new trial granted ... But mere exeessiveness of a verdict, without more, does not necessarily show that the verdict was arrived at by passion or prejudice . .. But the facts must be such that the excess can be determined as a matter of law, or the verdict must be so excessive as to be shocking to one’s conscience and to clearly indicate passion, prejudice, or corruption on the part of the jury.
No assertion is made on this appeal by the plaintiff bank that the damages for mental suffering were given under “passion or prejudice.” The majority opinion recognizes the necessity of finding passion or prejudice before punitive damages can be reduced. The same requirement should obtain here with respect to damages for mental suffering. I would affirm the award of $25,000 without reduction.