Court Opinion

ID: 9751515
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 16:33:07.108855+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:26:49.922433
License: Public Domain

The opinion of the court was delivered by
Oliphant, J.
This is an automobile accident case in which ■suit was instituted by the plaintiff for damages resulting from the death of her intestate. Three motor vehicles were involved, an automobile owned and operated by defendant Settle in which the deceased was a passenger, a truck of the Fischer Baking Company, which was being operated by its employee Schirber, and a bus owned by the Central Greyhound Lines, Inc., of New York, and operated by its employee Heasley. Each of the five defendants are charged in separate counts and all of them are charged jointly with negligence which proximately caused the death of Mr. Ferry.
The jury returned a verdict of no cause of action as against the defendant Settle and of $100,000 against all the other defendants. On motion made to the trial court this was later reduced to $85,450 and judgments for that amount were ■entered.
An appeal was then taken by the unsuccessful defendants to the Appellate Division. These defendants Fischer Baking Company and Schirber contended, inter alia, that certain testimony, which will be alluded to hereafter, should have been excluded and that its reception into evidence constituted harmful, prejudicial error as to them.-
The Appellate Division reversed the judgments below as to all four defendants on the ground of error in the admission ■of the complained of testimony. 6 N. J. Super. 107 (1950). Following this decision the plaintiff petitioned for a rehearing which was granted and after reargument the court filed its opinion in which it modified its earlier decision and held that the cause of action against the various defendants was separable and that the judgments entered in the trial court *257should be reversed as to the Eischer Baking Company and Schirber only. It accordingly ordered the judgments affirmed as against the Central Greyhound Lines and Heasley and a new trial on the issue of liability as to the Fischer Baking Company and Schirber. 7 N. J. Super. 253 (1950).
Both the plaintiff and defendants Central Greyhound Lines, Inc., and Heasley sought certification to review the determination of the Appellate Division, and their petitions were granted. We are concerned here with the appeal of the plaintiff alone.
At the trial, after all the defendants had testified, Heasley was recalled to the stand by counsel for the defendant Settle and on cross-examination by his own counsel, who also represented Central Greyhound, testified over the objection by counsel for the plaintiff, the baking company and Schirber that Settle, sometime after the' accident, had said to him: “Son, -you have nothing to worry about. It isn’t» your fault.” Then Settle’s counsel asked the witness, “He also said to you that it was not the fault of either of you, didn’t he, either you or himself ?” and over the objection of counsel for the baking company and Schirber he was permitted to answer, “He did say that.-” '
The appellant admits this testimony was technically hearsay but urges it was obviously and demonstrably ignored by the jury and that its reception into evidence did not injuriously affect the substantial rights of the defendants here whose liability was amply established by other and competent evidence.
 The testimony was not admissible for any purpose. It was not part of the res gestee and it was palpably self-serving. Further, it called for a stated conclusion and opinions of a layman with respect to liability. Its admission being error, did it injuriously affect the substantial rights of the baking company and Schirber? We are of the opinion it did. While tending to exculpate Settle, the Central Greyhound and Heasley it inculpated the other defendants. Since it was apparent that the accident was not an unavoidable occurrence, Settle, by exonerating himself and the Central Greyhound *258driver, created the very forceful inference that the accident was due to the negligence of the baking company’s driver. While it is true there was other evidence which, if believed, would show negligence on the part of the baking company’s driver, and while the rule is that erroneously admitted testimony cannot be regarded as harmful, if the jury ignored it in reaching its verdict, Jaeger v. Elizabethtown Consolidated Gas Co., 124 N. J. L. 420 (Sup. Ct. 1940), nevertheless the actions of the three drivers were being considered and tested under all the facts on the question of their negligence. Who can say the incompetent testimony complained of did not tip or may not have tipped the scales against the baking company’s driver even though the verdict found Heasley and the Central Greyhound guilty of negligence and at the same time found no cause of action as to Settle ? The jury may have well given weight to the testimony, a conclusion which the verdict in Settle’s favor would tend to support, but it apparently did not consider it of sufficient weight to overcome other evidence inculpating Heasley and the Central Greyhound.
Since the weight of'the evidence is for the jury, an appellate court, in determining whether or not error is prejudicial should not attempt to weigh the erroneously admitted testimony but merely decide whether or not it could have been given weight by the jury. If it could then it auto-. matically follows that it was prejudicial within the meaning of Bule 1:2-20(b). If one had the wisdom of a Solomon it would be insufficient to fathom a jury’s collective mind and decide exactly what transpired therein and upon what testimony the jury based its verdict.
 We are not in accord with the other contention of the appellant that as the jury’s verdicts are supported by the weight of the competent evidence the erroneously admitted testimony cannot constitute reversible error. There is such a thing as harmless error but in this what has heretofore been said is applicable on this point. A verdict which may rest in any degree upon erroneously admitted incompetent, hearsay testimony cannot be supported. Arata v. Sullivan, 63 N. J. L. 46 (Sup. Ct. 1899).
*259No case has been cited to ns nor does our research disclose any wherein incompetent evidence tending to inculpate a party, which should have been excluded, has been held to be harmless error.
The judgments of the Appellate Division should be modified to the end that a trial de novo be had on all issues rather than on the issue of liability alone, and as so modified are affirmed. Costs will abide the event.