Court Opinion

ID: 9833394
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 22:40:54.8193+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:44:02.218929
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
We are of the opinion that we were in error in that portion of the opinion heretofore announced in this case which declared as an affirmative error the action of the trial court in giving paragraph 6a of its main charge, over the objection of appellant. This paragraph of the court’s charge required of the jury a double finding of fact before the appellant would be.entitled to a verdict at their hands. We will say that this practice has been held by the Supreme Court not to be affirmative error. It has further held that such defect can only be reached by the party complaining requesting a special instruction, presenting singly each defense, which special charge, if refused, constitutes error on the part of the court.
In the instant case appellant presented and requested a special Charge, but it was amended by the court and given. The said special charge and the notations thereon are as follows :
“Gentlemen of the jury, you are charged that, if you find and believe from the evidence that J. T. Sikes was operating the automobile on the occasion in question, in which plaintiffs were riding, and you further find from the evidence that the said J. T. Sikes was guilty of negligence, as that term has been heretofore defined to you, in driving upon and onto the track of the street car company without exercising ordinary care, as that term has been defined to you, to discover the approach of the moving street car, and that such negligence, if any, on the part of the said J. T. Sikes, was the sole cause of the injuries to plaintiffs, if any you find from the evidence, then in that event you are instructed that plaintiffs cannot recover, and you will therefore return a verdict for the defendant, provided you find that defendant was not guilty of negligence in any respect submitted to you in the court’s main charge.
“Given as amended, and defendant excepts to said amendment and refusal of the court to give same as originally presented.
“H. M. Richey, Judge.
“This special charge as presented refused, but given as amended by the court. Defendant excepts. • H. M. Richey, Judge.”
As held in our original opinion, we cannot consider this charge as an aid to appellant in its objection to paragraph 6a, because of its failure to have the trial judge note thereon what modification or amendment was made in said special requested charge as being violative of the provisions of article 1974, Vernon’s Civil Statutes 1918. However, we are confronted with appellant’s further contention that, although it is precluded from having its objection to the amendment made by the trial judge passed upon, in that it failed to have said amendment set forth as provided for in the above article of the Revised Statutes, thereby enabling this court to determine if such amendment' was error, yet it contends that the charge as amended is affirmatively wrong on its face, and appellant having objected to the giving of such special charge as amended entitles it to a reversal of this case. We are of the opinion that appellant’s contention is correct.
In our original opinion herein we did not consider this objection. In addition to the objections made by appellant and noted on the special charges as amended and given, the appellant, in paragraph 8 of its objections and exceptions to the court’s charge, made the following exception and objection to the giving of the special charge in question as amended:
“The defendant objects and excepts to the giving of special charge requested by defendant as amended by the court, for the reason that the same is not a proper charge on the law, because, if the negligence of J. T. Sikes, if any, was the sole cause of plaintiff’s injuries, then defendant would be entitled to a verdict at the hands of the jury, notwithstanding the agents in charge of the street car might also have been guilty of negligence.”
 This objection was duly presented as required by law and was made the basis of appellant’s twelfth assignment of error, and brought forward in its propositions of law herein presented. The charge complained of *592is affirmatively wrong, in that the proviso is conflicting with the body of the charge. It tells the jury that they cannot find for appellant, even though Sikes was the sole proximate cause of .the injury, if they find that-the appellant was. “guilty of negligence in any respect submitted to you in the court’s main charge.” The giving of this special charge as amended over the objection of appellant made it the court’s charge. The mere fact that appellant presented such special charge, even though erroneous, if amended and given by the trial judge over the objection of appellant, does not make it appellant’s charge. Articles 1971, 1972, 1973, 1974, 1984a, and 1985, Vernon’s Sayles’ Civil .Statutes, make it the duty of the court, in a trial by jury, to submit all of the controverted fact issues made by the pleadings and the evidence, and to submit them separately and distinctly, avoiding all intermingling. The statute further requires that objections to the court’s charge must be made at the conclusion of the evidence, before the argument, and before the court’s charge is read to the jury, else the objections are waived.
In the case at bar appellant not only had its objections noted on the special charge as amended and given by the trial court, but also specifically objected to the same, as shown by its exception and objection above quoted.
We are of the opinion that the court erred in giving the special charge as amended over appellant’s objection; and the motion for rehearing is overruled.
Motion overruled.