Court Opinion

ID: 9419253
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:48:02.098536+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:16.724008
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Murphy,
dissenting:
In view of the high value and importance attached by custom and tradition to the right of jury trial as a feature of our federal jurisprudence, and the significant emphasis provided by the federal and state constitutions, scrupulous care should be exercised by courts and judges to avoid rulings, on motions for the direction of a verdict, which in effect wrongfully deprive a litigant of the cherished right. On such a motion our function is not to evaluate the evidence for the purpose of determining whether fraud has been committed. I am unable to agree with the opinion of the Court, because I think there was sufficient evidence to justify submitting the issue of fraud to the jury.
The opinion of the Court recognizes that the testimony of Glickman and the evidence of the gastro-intestinal examination were insufficient to sustain the direction of a *341verdict, and correctly states the issue thus: “The case of the Government for a directed verdict rests, therefore, upon the statements of Pence made after the reinstatement of his insurance and contradicting the representations in his application for reinstatement.” So stated, the case presents a controverted question of fact, and, in view of the evidence in this case, it was for the jury to find the answer by resolving the conflict between the two contrary sets of self-serving statements made by Pence.
It is admitted that “Pence’s representations in the application were not evidence of their own veracity.” As an abstract matter one would suppose that Pence’s later conflicting statements were likewise “not evidence of their own veracity.” However, it is said that reasonable men have no choice but to admit the truth of those later statements, because they “were repeated, and usually under oath; they are in no way improbable, and are the statements of one who, himself a doctor, spoke with knowledge of the subject and bearing of his statements.” These factors might be persuasive to a jury that the later statements were true, but it is quite a different thing to hold that they absolutely compel belief. On the basis of the record, an equally plausible premise is that the statements in the application were the true ones. Pence was never absent from work for any appreciable period of time. The reports of his physical examinations from 1928 to his death were not altogether consistent, and any defect disclosed was evidently thought insufficient to warrant allowing any of his various claims for disability benefits, etc. His widow testified that they were “pretty close to one another,” that she believed he would have told her if anything was seriously wrong with him, and that she had no knowledge of any serious ailment or consultation with a physician on his part. All this casts doubt on the truth of Pence’s statements made after his application for the *342reinstatement of his insurance and entitled the jury to pass judgment on them.
Whether Pence was a malingerer or not, disavowing and then asserting injury and disease as a means of collecting different benefits from the Government, is not for us to decide. Suspicion that such was the case does not justify usurping the jury’s function of determining, in the light of all the evidence, which of Pence’s statements were true and which were false. The case was properly submitted to the jury. Its verdict, rendered on substantial evidence, should not have been set aside.
Mr. Justice Black and Mr. Justice Douglas join in this dissent.