Court Opinion

ID: 9536724
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:05:52.374041+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:55:08.501378
License: Public Domain

HENRIOD, Justice
(concurring and dissenting) .
I concur with that portion of the main opinion having to do with the implied warranty question, but dissent from that which treats the res ipsa loquitur phase of the case.
The defendant was charged with negligence, and the facts upon which such- negli*99gence was claimed were presented in evidence. The jury found defendant was not negligent, and how, under such circumstances an inference of negligence under the res ipsa loquitur rule, or how that rule itself, could change that basic fact, is difficult for this writer to understand. There was direct evidence as to the precise cause of the injury and the facts attending the occurrence appeared in this case. In such event the doctrine is inapplicable,1 add the language of Sec. 299 of 38 Am.Jur. 995, is apropos when it says that “Where all the facts attending the injury are disclosed by the evidence, and nothing is left to inference, no presumption or inference can be indulged, and the doctrine of res ipsa loqui-tur has no application.”
To send this case back for a new trial because the court did not instruct as to res ipsa loquitur, under the circumstances of this case, is, in the opinion of this writer, not only an unwarranted sanction for plaintiff, the loser, to take another whack at the defendant, but is to call on the res ipsa loquitur rule to apply in a case where it is inapplicable, and where the facts showing cause and effect have been presented to and held by the jury not to constitute negligence on the part of defendant.
McDONOUGH, C. J., concurs in the views expressed by Mr. Justice HENRIOD.
WORTHEN, J., does not participate.