Court Opinion

ID: 9587246
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:19:54.20932+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:36:32.292463
License: Public Domain

Pannell, Judge,
dissenting. The evidence in this case was substantially the same as the evidence in the previous case before this court (Lathan v. Murrah, Inc., 121 Ga. App. 554 (174 SE2d 269)). The second paragraph of the majority opinion states that there is no evidence in this case as to the nurse momentarily turning aside to get the restraining support with which she intended to fasten the patient in her chair.
*260There is no dispute that Mrs. Kuhlman was the administrator of Cedar Hills Nursing Home at the time of the alleged occurrence. Page 19 of the transcript gives the following testimony by Mrs. Stowe of a conversation had with Mrs. Kuhlman: "Q. What did she tell you? A. She told me that mother had fallen. Q. And what had happened? A. That the nurse had taken her up and she fell backwards. She had reached to get something off the table and the nurse let her fall backward. Q. When she fell, did she tell you what happened to her? A. No. Q. Did she tell you whether or not she received any injuries? A. Well, she said she hit her head. Q. Did she tell you where she hit her head? A. No, sir. Q. Can you go into a little more details about what she told you about why she fell? — Or did she tell you that? A. No, sir. Q. I mean about what the nurse did or did not do? A. She just told me the nurse reached back to get something off the table and let her fall backward.” This would be an admission by the superintendent of the defendant and would not be hearsay. See Chero-Cola Bottling Co. v. Southern Express Co., 29 Ga. App. 656 (116 SE 325); Brooks v. Sessoms, 47 Ga. App. 554 (171 SE 222). Therefore, the law of the case would control and the direction of the verdict by the trial court would be error and should be reversed.
I am authorized to state that Judges Whitman and Evans concur in this dissent.