Court Opinion

ID: 9522048
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 02:17:17.171815+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:02:14.742091
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE HEIPLE, dissenting: The majority decision in this case is without support in case law, in statute or in court rule. That is to say, it enunciates a wholly new proposition of law. The proposition is that a party may be barred from introducing testimony or other evidence on any matter relating to physical evidence if the physical evidence has been disposed of and cannot be produced. In the case at hand, the plaintiff has been barred from presenting evidence regarding a defective furnace because the furnace was disposed of and could not be produced for the defendant’s inspection. The justification for the ruling is that the destruction of the furnace was done corruptly by the plaintiff in order to secure an unfair advantage in a lawsuit that was being contemplated but not yet filed. While I question the finding that the destruction was corrupt, that particular point is not material. In fact, the State Fire Marshal had fully investigated the fire, the insurance company had done likewise, and the homeowners wanted to get the fire debris disposed of. Even accepting the bad light put on plaintiffs’ actions, however, it should not make any difference. The point is that at the time of destruction of the furnace, there was no lawsuit on file and no directive from any court prohibiting the plaintiffs from hauling their fire debris to the junkyard. Later, when the plaintiffs were directed to produce the furnace, the order could not be complied with because it was impossible for them to do so. Interestingly, in the case at hand, the furnace itself was not the only material evidence relating to the cause of the fire. It is equally arguable that all of the fire scene evidence was material. The burned house and its contents could or might show that the fire began in a different area than the furnace, say from a hot electrical wire or from a combustible agent, etc. The precedential implications of this ruling are truly enormous. Future plaintiffs may likewise find themselves tossed out of court because they tossed out their junk. It could be a wrecked car, a severed body part, an item of clothing, a bandage, a dead cat. Who knows? Doubtless, resourceful defendants will find good reasons for claiming that plaintiffs corruptly destroyed this or that item of physical evidence knowing full well that a lawsuit was being contemplated and that the evidence would be material. Finally, regarding the furnace in this case, it seems to me that the defendants, who were the manufacturers and installers of the furnace in question, would have been well able to meet the plantiffs’ case with the testimony of their own designers, engineers and installers. The destruction of the ruined furnace by the plaintiffs really only goes to the weight of plaintiff’s evidence and could be considered by the jury in light of all the evidence in the case. The action taken by the trial court in this case and affirmed by a majority of this appellate court has deprived plaintiffs of their day in court and has created an unfortunate precedent in so doing. Accordingly, I dissent.