Court Opinion

ID: 9740270
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 20:31:22.967817+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:17.214923
License: Public Domain

Bashara, J.
(dissenting). I respectfully dissent. At the hearing on the motion for a mistrial, the court gave the following account of the incident:
"THE COURT: I’ll inform you at this point. The information you have one Juror approaching the Court after the conclusion of the day’s trial was correct to this extent: After everyone had left, he told my Court Reporter that he wanted to tell me something. I asked the Court Reporter to remain, to bring him in and remain in my chambers. He stated the day before he was on a bus and as he was leaving the bus, he noticed the Plaintiff was on the same bus. He departed, heading toward a hotel, the Plaintiff did, and departed heading for his home. I also recall and the Court Reporter can verify this, that he said something to the effect that he had a friend living in the same hotel, but that he had never seen the Plaintiff there and was unaware that that was where the Plaintiff lived. That was the sum and substance of the matter.
"I told him thank you for reporting it and excused him.
"I frankly had intended to inform Counsel the next day of the statement feeling that it was without impact or effect and inadvertently did not do so. I had the Court Reporter search the record to see if I had done so."
The trial judge then stated that he wished to *70examine the juror and an alternate juror, whose affidavit supporting the juror’s statement was also filed. A date for the next hearing was set, but the plaintiff failed to pursue his motion, and never obtained an evidentiary ruling on the matter.
As the trial judge stated at the hearing, plaintiff’s allegations raise a serious question which, if confirmed, might necessitate a new trial. Fisher v Bernard, 386 Mich 182; 191 NW2d 323 (1971), Cooper v Carr, 161 Mich 405; 126 NW 468 (1910). However, plaintiff was obligated to continue with his motion and to obtain a ruling on the matter in the trial court. The plaintiff also is obligated to provide this Court with a sufficient record from which it can determine whether the trial judge was in error, had the motion been denied. Lemanski v Ford Motor Co, 82 Mich App 244; 266 NW2d 775 (1978), lv den 405 Mich 811 (1979).
The plaintiff’s abandonment of his motion, and his failure to obtain a ruling by the trial court after the judge had scheduled an evidentiary hearing on the matter, amounts to a waiver of the claim, precluding review by this Court. We need take the matter no further.
I would affirm.