Court Opinion

ID: 9533335
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:30:40.338248+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:29:01.122487
License: Public Domain

VALLEE, J.
I dissent. I am of the opinion the court erred in excluding the record in the Meredith case insofar as it shows that after the cause was fully tried and while the jury was deliberating, defendant in open court stipulated that judgment be entered in favor of the plaintiffs in that action and that judgment was entered pursuant to the stipulation. The stipulation constituted an admission of negligence. (McClure v. Steele, 326 Mich. 286 [40 N.W.2d 153, 13 A.L.R.2d 160]. Cf. Gonzales v. Pacific Greyhound Lines, 34 Cal.2d 749, 754 [214 P.2d 809].) Certainly such conduct circum*414stantially implied a consciousness of liability entirely different from an extrajudicial compromise. Of course, it was evidentiary only. That the error was prejudicial goes without saying.
Brown v. Pacific Electric Ry. Co., 79 Cal.App.2d 613 [180 P.2d 424], quoted by the majority, is not at all analogous. That case involved an extrajudicial, out-of-court compromise settlement of a modest claim. Here we have a solemn, formal, judicial stipulation of liability which necessarily included an admission of negligence. The Santa Fe did not agree to a judgment against it for $125,000 merely to buy its peace.
A petition for a rehearing was denied November 5, 1958. Vallée, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted. Appellant’s petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied December 17, 1958. Gibson, C. J., and Carter, J., were of the opinion that the petition should be granted.