Court Opinion

ID: 9772384
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 17:16:20.883869+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:43.931351
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing or, in the Alternative, to Transfer to Court en Banc.
PER CURIAM.
As may be noted in reading the opinion,, we refuse to hold as a judicial admission plaintiff’s own testimony that the legs designed to support the rack were loose and’ that nobody used the hoist to raise the-rack and load, the testimony carrying the inference that the rack and load had been supported by the cables of the hoist from Kansas City to Sugarland. This ruling,, says movant-appellant, is erroneous and in conflict with the well-established rule restated in Smith v. Siercks, Mo.Sup., 277 S.W.2d 521, at page 525, as follows, “ ‘But a party’s testimony on the stand as a witness may be of such a nature as to have the effect of a judicial admission which not only relieves the opponent from adducing evidence, but precludes the party himself from disputing it, either by his own testimony or by other witnesses. Wigmore, Evidence, Sec. 2495a (3d Ed.). Thus, if a party in full possession of his mental faculties testifies unequivocally and understandingly to a material fact peculiarly within his own personal knowledge, which negatives his right of action or defense, he is precluded from relying upon any testimony to the contrary, unless he gives some reasonable explanation of his previous statement as having been the result of mistake, oversight, lapse of memory or misunderstanding. In the absence of such an ex*475planation, the party may not have the benefit of any testimony which is contrary to his own testimony, whether given by himself, Steele v. Kansas City Southern R. Co., 265 Mo. 97, 175 S.W. 177, by his adversary’s witnesses, Elkin v. St. Louis Public Service Co., 335 Mo. 951, 958, 74 S.W.2d 600, or by his own witnesses. Mollman v. St. Louis Public Service Co., Mo.App., 192 S.W.2d 618, 621, and cases cited. Where, however, the testimony of a party is not a positive statement of fact within his own knowledge, but is a mere estimate or opinion, it does not have the effect of a judicial admission. * * ” We have not intended to change the rule as restated in the Smith case, neither did we here ingraft an exception upon it, we think. The reexamination of our ruling on this contention as it is presented in the instant record bulwarks the view that the opinion in this respect is correct. In the instant case it was and is our opinion that, considering all of the relevant evidence, plaintiff’s testimony that the legs were loose and that no one had loosened them was a statement and a conclusion which (a jury reasonably could have found) were contrary to the ■actual facts established by more knowledgeable testimony as well as. the operation of physical laws; and a statement and conclusion which did not, under all of the circumstances, amount to a positive statement of fact within the plaintiff’s own knowledge, and thus was only an opinion lacking the effect of a judicial admission.
 Also we have reconsidered our ■opinion in its treatment with the contention (8) of res judicata. As we have said the insurer instituted an action in its own name in the District Court of the United States asserting a claim measured by its right of subrogation, and did not appeal from the District Court’s judgment of dismissal, which judgment was based on the ground that the action was barred by limitation — a judgment conflicting with the judgment of this court in Giambelluca v. Thompson, General Acc. Fire and Life Assur. Corp., Intervenor, Mo.Sup., supra, 283 S.W.2d 531. Movant-appellant has pointed out that it did not object to the splitting of the single, joint inseverable claim thus asserted in the District Court by the insurer, and states in its instant motion that plaintiff’s individual interest in the claim is “not affected one iota” by the District Court’s judgment adverse to the insurer. This has been the question which has been troublesome to us, and we have in the principal opinion declined to order a reduction measured by the amount of the award to which the insurer would have been entitled by subrogation. This, because we doubted that plaintiff is protected in the instant case by the District Court’s judgment in that action to which plaintiff was not a party. We have a regard for the principle that in Missouri whoever (the employer or the employee [as here]) recovers on the claim against a third person tort-feasor holds so much of the recovery as in truth and fact belongs to the other as an express trustee — ■ the employee to see that the employer’s right of subrogation is protected, and the employer to see that the employee receives any surplus after his indemnification. General Box Co. v. Missouri Utilities Co., 331 Mo. 845, 55 S.W.2d 442; Reiling v. Russell, supra, 345 Mo. 517, 134 S.W.2d 33; Schumaker v. Leslie, 360 Mo. 1238, 232 S.W.2d 913. We have concluded, however, that, in this case, inasmuch as the insurer, having been a party-intervenor in this case but subsequent to the remand of this cause upon former appeal dismissed its intervening petition and consented to the prosecution of the action on the whole claim by plaintiff in his own name, plaintiff is protected and the insurer bound by our recognition of the District Court’s judgment adverse to the insurer on its right of subrogation. Plaintiff, in the trial court and herein upon appeal, has the insurer’s consent and in good faith endeavored to protect and recover on the whole claim including the recovery measured by the insurer’s right of subrogation. In this situation we hold that plaintiff is not now subject to account as a trustee to insurer for any sum remaining after a reduction of the award to the extent *476of $9,399.37, which is now ordered and our principal opinion is accordingly modified, which amount is equal to that paid by insurer as compensation and medical expenses. This reduction is additional to the conditional remittitur of $25,000, to which remittitur plaintiff has heretofore on January 21, 1959, consented.
Therefore, the judgment in favor of plaintiff and against defendant should stand in the amount of $40,600.63 as .of the date of original rendition, April 12, 1957, and it is so ordered. The motion for a rehearing or, in the alternative, to transfer to the Court en Banc is overruled.