Court Opinion

ID: 9709983
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 03:58:58.632436+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:53.205097
License: Public Domain

Caporale, J.,
dissenting.
Inasmuch as there was no objection to the statement of plaintiff’s counsel arguably commenting on the credibility of one of the defendants, I do not concern myself with that aspect of the case other than to direct attention to Canon 7, EC 7-24, of the Code of Professional Responsibility (improper for lawyer to express personal opinion as to credibility of witness).
However, there was an objection to the imploration of plaintiff’s counsel that in judging the negligence of the defendants, the jurors consider what they would have done had they been in the plaintiff’s place and reflect upon the consequences of their, or their family members’, being in the vicinity of the driving defendant at the wrong time. This, as the majority found, constituted an improper argument. But the majority then concludes that the impropriety was not prejudicial.
In reaching that conclusion, the majority relies on Thorpe v. Zwonechek, 177 Neb. 504, 129 N.W.2d 483 (1964). As the *401majority correctly outlines, in that case this court concluded that as the argument therein that the jurors should consider what plaintiff’s pain and suffering would be worth to them was “ ‘so closely interwoven with discussion as to what a reasonably prudent person would award,’ ” there was no prejudice. However, the Thorpe opinion does not detail the argument, and we thus cannot determine what the Thorpe court considered as constituting such a close interweaving.
But whatever may have been involved in Thorpe, the argument here does not relate the defendants’ liability to the doing or failure to do that which a reasonably careful person in similar circumstances would or would not do. Rather, the argument improperly and contrary to well-settled law ties the defendants’ liability to what the jurors would like to see done should they or members of their families be confronted with the situation in which the plaintiff found himself.
I certainly understand and accept that the latitude allowed one during the trial of a cause rests in the discretion of the trial court and that in the absence of prejudice resulting therefrom, misconduct in argument is not a ground for reversal. Harmon Cable Communications v. Scope Cable Television, 237 Neb. 871, 468 N.W.2d 350 (1991). But see Canon 7, DR 7-102(A)(2), of the Code of Professional Responsibility (improper for lawyer to knowingly advance defense not warranted by existing law).
In any event, implicit in the majority’s analysis is the determination that the trial court was wrong in failing to sustain the defendants’ objection to the improper argument and that it thus abused its discretion in the latitude it permitted plaintiff’s counsel. With that implication I obviously agree, but just as obviously, I part company with the majority’s conclusion that the trial court’s erroneous ruling resulted in no prejudice to the defendants. The record simply does not support that determination.
I would therefore reverse, and remand for a new trial.
White and Fahrnbruch, J J., join in this dissent.