Court Opinion

ID: 9890860
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-10-16 17:04:45.485062+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:36:24.162352
License: Public Domain

Filed 10/16/23 Mac v. Lopez CA4/1
                 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS
California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for
publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication
or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

                COURT OF APPEAL, FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT

                                                 DIVISION ONE

                                         STATE OF CALIFORNIA

                                                                      D081094
 SONNY MAC,

           Plaintiff and Respondent,
                                                                      (Super. Ct. No. 37-2020-
           v.                                                         00036703-CU-PA-CTL)

 AURELIO GOMEZ LOPEZ,

           Defendant and Appellant.

         APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of San Diego County,
John S. Meyer, Judge. Affirmed.
         Straus Meyers and Douglas J. Petkoff for Defendant and Appellant.
         Andy Van Le and Associates and Andy Van Le for Plaintiff and
Respondent.
                                               INTRODUCTION
         A jury found Aurelio Gomez Lopez’s negligence in a motor vehicle
collision was a substantial factor in causing injuries to Sonny Mac. It
awarded Mac a total of $302,595.09 in economic and noneconomic damages,
including $200,000 for future medical expenses. On appeal, Lopez asserts
substantial evidence does not support the award for future medical expenses.
He contends the testimony of Mac’s medical expert that $200,000 was “a
reasonable estimate” for surgery and follow-up care to treat Mac’s neck
injuries was “wildly speculative” and “of poor ‘quality,’ ” and thus the jury
must have speculated on damages. We affirm.
                                BACKGROUND
      Mac and Lopez were both driving in adjacent lanes on the highway in
morning rush hour traffic. Lopez was in a truck and Mac was in a minivan.
As Lopez changed lanes, his truck hit the back of Mac’s minivan.
      After the accident, Mac “felt dull pain” in her neck that progressed to
“sharp pain” the next day as if needles were “pinching on” her neck and
“radiat[ing] down to [her] shoulder,” her hands, her fingers, and then she
“started to feel numbness.” She also started to feel pain at the “back of [her]
skull,” have “really bad headaches” and felt “nauseated.” A couple nights
after the accident, she vomited “through the whole night.”
      Three months of chiropractic treatment helped, but her neck pain,
achiness, vomiting, and headache eventually returned. She then went to see
a neurosurgeon after her neck pain got worse. She had a “pinching nerve”
and muscle spasms that were “very painful” and led to headaches and
vomiting. Although physical therapy and pain management treatment gave
her “temporary relief,” eventually “all the symptoms” returned.
      Mac’s claim for future medical expenses was supported by the
unchallenged testimony of her expert, Dr. Kevin Yoo, M.D., a board-certified
neurological surgeon with 18 years of experience performing brain and spine
surgeries and treating approximately 250 to 300 patients a year. Lopez did
not object or challenge Dr. Yoo’s qualifications in neurosurgery when Mac
offered him as her medical expert.

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      Dr. Yoo treated Mac as a patient and also reviewed her medical records
from other doctors, including a physical therapist, pain specialist, and
chiropractor. He diagnosed Mac with cervical disc issues, including disc
displacement, neck pain, and pain in her upper extremities. Mac completed
the care that Dr. Yoo recommended, including physical therapy, cervical
epidural injections, and chiropractic care. However, when Mac continued to
experience neck pain despite these treatments, Dr. Yoo determined she had
“a failure of conservative care” and recommended she consider cervical spine
surgery. He explained that “eventually the neck pain will get worse and
worse to the point where she will have to succumb to having a surgical
procedure.” He opined, “by a degree of medical probability that [the] car
crash . . . caused [ ] Mac’s symptoms arising out of the neck pain and leading
to the surgery.”
      Dr. Yoo testified the cost of the surgery varied depending on whether it
is done on an inpatient or outpatient basis. He estimated the cost of the
surgery alone on an outpatient basis would be “somewhere between” $50,000
to $100,000, and if on an inpatient basis, with the added costs of hospital
care, it would be “somewhere between [$]100[,000] to [$]150[,000] to
[$]200,000.” He explained he gave himself “a lot of latitude” in providing his
“reasonable estimate,” and that “it’s a big range.”
      Dr. Yoo then testified, “If I did Ms. Mac’s surgery, I would do it as
outpatient, and I would say . . . $100,000 is probably a good estimate just for
the surgery alone, but then you’ve got to include all the post-op care, which I
did not include in that.” (Italics added.) Dr. Yoo explained Mac would incur
costs for physical therapy, additional pain care management, follow-up visits
and imaging, and for “[t]he recovery process itself.” He opined that a

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“reasonable estimate” for outpatient surgery by him and follow-up care by
other medical professionals would be a total $200,000.
      Lopez did not make any objections during Dr. Yoo’s entire direct
testimony. On cross-examination, Lopez’s counsel asked Dr. Yoo only five
questions, to confirm he assessed Mac with cervical disc degeneration at the
C4-C5 and C5-C6 levels and to explain that cervical disc degeneration was
“[s]imply put, aging . . . over time.” Lopez’s counsel did not ask Dr. Yoo any
questions regarding his estimate of Mac’s future medical expenses if she
proceeded with cervical spine surgery. Lopez also did not present any expert
of her own to refute Mac’s claim for future medical expenses.
                                DISCUSSION
                                       I.
        Lopez Is Precluded from Challenging the Amount of the Jury’s
 Future Medical Damages Award for Failure to File a Motion for New Trial
      Mac contends Lopez waived his right to argue that damages were
excessive because he failed to file a motion for a new trial. We agree.
      In his opening brief on appeal, Lopez states “[t]he only issue on appeal
is the amount of future medical expenses.” (Italics added.) While conceding
that “[a] reasonable jury . . . may have awarded damages somewhere in the
range” of Dr. Yoo’s estimate, he assigns error to the jury’s award because it
“adopted the outer limit of the possible range he provided for future medical
expenses as an award.” Lopez further argues that Mac’s counsel’s improper
questioning and argument affected the jury’s award of the amount so that
they “felt comfortable . . . awarding an amount of $200,000.00” rather than a
lower amount. Further still, he argues the jury erred when it speculated “as
to the amount of future medical expenses.” (Italics added.) Thus, Lopez

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framed his argument as a challenge to the amount of damages and effectively

claims it was excessive.1
      Lopez has waived any argument that the award was excessive because
he failed to move for a new trial. (Greenwich S.F., LLC v. Wong (2010) 190
Cal.App.4th 739, 759 (Greenwich) [“A claim of excessive or inadequate
damages cannot be raised on appeal unless appellant first urged the error in
a timely motion for new trial.”]; Jamison v. Jamison (2008) 164 Cal.App.4th
714, 719 [“A failure to timely move for a new trial ordinarily precludes a
party from complaining on appeal that the damages awarded were
excessive.”].) As the court in Jamison explained, trial courts “weigh the
evidence and resolve issues of credibility,” not appellate courts. (Jamison, at
p. 719.) By challenging the damages award for the first time on appeal
rather than through a motion for new trial, Lopez has “unnecessarily
burden[ed] the appellate court with issues that can and should [have been]
resolved at the trial level.” (Ibid.) Accordingly, Lopez waived his claim that
damages were excessive.
                                      II.
         Substantial Evidence Supports the Jury’s Decision to Award
                  Future Medical Damages, In Any Amount
      Only after Mac asserted that Lopez was precluded from asserting an
excessive damages claim, did Lopez argue in his reply brief that the evidence
was insufficient to award any damages at all. “[W]e do not consider
arguments raised for the first time in a reply brief.” (Doe v. McLaughlin
(2022) 83 Cal.App.5th 640, 657.) But even if Lopez had timely asserted the

1     This was confirmed by Lopez’s appellate counsel at oral argument, who
stated there was no substantial evidence to support “the amount that [the
jury] actually did award.”
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argument, we conclude there was substantial evidence supporting the jury’s
award of future medical expenses.
      As we have noted, because Lopez did not file a motion for a new trial to
challenge the amount of the jury’s damages award, we are limited to
determining “[w]hether the evidence was sufficient to support the award . . .
in any amount.” (Greenwich, supra, 190 Cal.App.4th at p. 759.) We review a
contention that evidence does not support a damage award for substantial
evidence. (Yassin v. Solis (2010) 184 Cal.App.4th 524, 529.) We accept all
evidence which supports the judgment, disregard the conflicting evidence,
and draw all reasonable inferences to uphold the verdict. (Major v. Western
Home Ins. Co. (2009) 169 Cal.App.4th 1197, 1203, fn. 1.) “The testimony of a
single credible witness . . . may constitute ‘substantial evidence.’ ” (Id. at
p. 1208.)
      Civil Code section 3283 provides for the recovery of future damages. It
states: “Damages may be awarded, in a judicial proceeding, for detriment
resulting after the commencement thereof, or certain to result in the future.”
“The fact that the amount of future damages may be difficult to measure or
subject to various possible contingencies does not bar recovery.” (Regalado v.
Callaghan (2016) 3 Cal.App.5th 582, 602 (Regalado).) Relevant here, “[i]t is
‘not required’ for a doctor to ‘testify that he or she is reasonably certain that
the plaintiff would be disabled in the future. All that is required to establish
future disability is that from all the evidence, including the expert testimony,
if there be any, it satisfactorily appears that such disability will occur with
reasonable certainty.’ ” (Garcia v. Duro Dyne Corp. (2007) 156 Cal.App.4th
92, 93.)
      On this record, we conclude Dr. Yoo’s unchallenged expert testimony
was substantial evidence to support the jury’s decision to award future

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medical damages. (See Hope v. California Youth Authority (2005) 134
Cal.App.4th 577, 589 [“the testimony of a single witness may be sufficient”].)
Contrary to Lopez’s argument, the jury’s award is not invalidated merely
because Dr. Yoo gave a range for Mac’s future expenses due to contingencies
such as whether the surgery would be outpatient or inpatient. (Regalado,
supra, 3 Cal.App.5th at p. 602.) In Regalado, like here, “[t]he fact that there
was some uncertainty as to whether [plaintiff] would . . . requir[e] additional
surgery does not preclude a finding that it was reasonably certain he would
need future surgery.” (Ibid.) In Ostertag v. Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corp.
(1944) 65 Cal.App.2d 795, the plaintiff’s expert testified: It was “ ‘reasonable
to assume’ ” plaintiff was “ ‘going to have trouble . . . in the future. Just how
much, I don’t know. Just what the course of that trouble will be, I don’t
know.’ ” (Id. at pp. 805–806.) The court found this testimony “sufficient to
support a finding of future damages with reasonable certainty.” (Id. at p.
806.) Similarly, in Guerra v. Balestrieri (1954) 127 Cal.App.2d 511, 518–519,
the expert’s opinion on future damages was based on plaintiff’s pain two
years after the accident and his experience that “ ‘[f]requently in this type of
neck injury a patient will continue to have symptoms indefinitely’ and ‘[i]t
may last forever; . . . it may get worse; he may improve somewhat.’ ” The
court held, “[f]rom such testimony the jury could reasonably conclude that
plaintiff was reasonably certain to experience some pain and disability for the
rest of his life.” (Id. at p. 519.)
      Lopez also complains that Mac’s attorney made “improper” statements
and asked “leading and therefore improper” questions during Dr. Yoo’s
testimony. Lopez’s evidentiary challenges are forfeited because he failed to
object in the trial court. (Padilla v. Greater El Monte Community Hospital
(2005) 129 Cal.App.4th 667, 670 [“Failing to timely object to a purported

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error when it occurs in the trial court ordinarily waives the objection on
appeal.”].) Additionally, the court instructed that “[w]hat the attorneys say
during the trial,” including their statements and questions, “are not
evidence.” (CACI No. 5002.) “[W]e presume the jury follows its instructions
‘and that its verdict reflects the legal limitations of those instructions
imposed.’ ” (Cassim v. Allstate Ins. Co. (2004) 33 Cal.4th 780, 803–804.)
                                 DISPOSITION
      The judgment is affirmed. Respondent shall recover her costs on
appeal. (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.278(a)(1).)

                                                                             DO, J.

WE CONCUR:

DATO, Acting P. J.

KELETY, J.

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