Court Opinion

ID: 9577329
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:33:53.199666+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:20:20.596390
License: Public Domain

M. S. Coleman, J.
(to affirm). This opinion speaks to part II of Justice Swainson’s opinion.

*572
FACTS

The plaintiffs were injured when their car ran into an expressway guard rail. They claim that the accident occurred when a tire manufactured by defendant ruptured.
During trial plaintiffs sought "to place into evidence questions and answers of interrogatories which were put to the defendant, which they answered under oath.” The court granted the request. The plaintiffs then introduced part of the interrogatory indicating that defendant’s inspection of the tire disclosed no unusual wear or use and that defendant was also unable to determine how many miles the tire had been driven.
Defendant immediately sought "to have the plaintiffs’ counsel read all the questions and answers”. The court said "[everything in the file is in evidence” and defendant could "read the rest of it because it is out of context”. Plaintiffs’ counsel objected and was overruled.
The information supplied by defendant’s reading of the remaining questions and answers gave the name and qualifications of the examiner. It contained his conclusion that the tire "lost its capability to retain inflation pressure as a result of a cut by a foreign object through the tire body.”
The jury returned a verdict of no cause of action. The Court of Appeals affirmed saying that the information supplied by defendant’s counsel "was relevant to another portion of the interrogatory previously introduced by the plaintiffs” and was properly allowed. I agree with the Court of Appeals. In fact, that portion read by plaintiffs was quite misleading and unfair without the reading of the portion in question.

*573
RULES

Rule 309.4 provides that answers to interrogatories "may be used to the same extent as provided in subrule 302.4 for the use of a deposition of a party”. Rule 302.4 reads, in part:
"At the trial or upon the hearing of a motion or an interlocutory proceeding, any part or all of a deposition, so far as admissible under the rules of evidence, may be used against any party who was present or represented at the taking of the deposition or who had due notice thereof, in accordance with any 1 of the following provisions:
"(4) If only part of a deposition is offered in evidence by a party, an adverse party may require him to introduce all of it which is relevant to the part introduced, and any party may introduce any other parts.”

DISCUSSION

The trial judge did not make a true determination of the admissibility of the answers to the interrogatory. He believed that once the interrogatory was offered as evidence, all material contained therein was admissible. This obviously does not accord with the language of the court rule, but the judge is saved by the facts.
Plaintiffs allege that the responses introduced by defendant are self-serving and hearsay. These allegations are worthy of consideration.
Rule 302.5 reads:
"Subject to the provisions of subrule 308.3, objection may be made at the trial or hearing to receiving in evidence any deposition or part thereof for any reason which would require the exclusion of the evidence if the witness were then present and testifying.”
I interpret this as eliminating hearsay objections *574with regard to depositions. The question remains as to whether it should control as to interrogatories. Rule 309.4 provides only that Rule 302.2 and 302.4 apply to the use of interrogatories. By its specificity Rule 309.4 implies that nonspecified rules are not applicable.
Such a conclusion is supported by the differences between depositions and interrogatories. A deposition is taken in an adversarial proceeding with examination and cross-examination. An interrogatory permits the answering party to respond in a careful, thoughtful and possibly evasive manner without being subject to examination on the responses. Although given under oath, the answers may simply be unresponsive or misleading. An individual’s response when being deposed is more closely related to trial testimony than responses to interrogatories.
Rule 309.4 is drawn from the former Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 33. In 3 Kooman, Federal Civil Practice § 33.26, the author draws these conclusions about use of interrogatories:
"Normally, a party’s answers to an opponent’s interrogatories are self-serving declarations and are not admissible on behalf of the party making the answers though they may be admissible against that party. However, where an original answer was introduced against the party making it, that party is entitled to read into evidence any other answers which tend to explain or correct the original answer. And an answer to an interrogatory may not be received in evidence on behalf of the party making it where the adverse party had no opportunity for cross-examination.” (Emphasis added.)
A similar analysis is made in 8 Wright and Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure, § 2180:
*575"The major problem associated with using answers to interrogatories at the trial comes from the hearsay rule. One party may introduce the answers of an adverse party as an admission of a party opponent. They may also be used by any party to impeach another party who takes the stand and gives testimony inconsistent with his answers to the interrogatories. A party cannot ordinarily introduce his own answers to an opponent’s interrogatories, since they would be self-serving statements. The answers of one defendant are not admissible as against another defendant, unless they should fall within some exception to the hearsay rule. If some of a party’s answers are properly introduced, the party who gave the answers may be allowed to introduce other answers that explain or correct the answers already introduced. "(Emphasis added.)
Also see 2A Barron and Holtzoff, Federal Practice and Procedure, § 778.
The 1970 amendments to the Federal rules modify Rule 33 to permit answers to interrogatories to be "used to the extent permitted by the rules of evidence.” The Advisory Committee’s Note to the Proposed Draft of the Rules said:
"The use of answers to interrogatories at trial is made subject to the rules of evidence. The provisions governing use of depositions, to which Rule 33 presently refers, are not entirely apposite to answers to interrogatories, since deposition practice contemplates that all parties will ordinarily participate through cross-examination.”
Despite the sweeping language of 302.4(4) it seems clear that the rules of evidence do not permit "any party” to introduce "any other parts” of an interrogatory once it is introduced as evidence. However, as the quotations above indicate, an adverse party may require that any part of the interrogatory "which is relevant to the part introduced” be read.
*576Honigman and Hawkins say Rule 302.4(4) "is designed to prevent unfairness which may result if a statement is taken out of context.” In their comments to Rule 309, they conclude that an answering party may not use the interrogatory "except to the extent that related answers may be put in evidence to prevent the unfairness of taking a single answer out of context.”
Other commentators support these conclusions. Rule 302.4(4) is drawn from former Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(d)(4). In 3 Kooman, Federal Civil Practice, § 26.21, the following analysis is made:
"This requirement provides a method of avoiding, as far as possible, any misimpressions from selective use of deposition testimony. The opposing party is entitled under the rule to have the context of any statement, or any qualification made as a part of the deponent’s testimony, put in evidence. The spirit of the rule dictates that the opposing party be able to require the introduction of such relevant parts of the deposition testimony at the conclusion of the reading of the part originally introduced.”
Also see 2A Barron and Holtzoff, Federal Practice and Procedure, § 654.
The Federal rule was amended in 1970 to permit introduction of "any other part which ought in fairness to be considered with the part introduced”. Wright and Miller say this avoids the danger "that the statement of the witness will be misinterpreted by selective use of portions of his [interrogatory] out of context or with qualifications of it omitted” — a comment germaine to the case at bar.

CONCLUSION

Justice Levin’s dissent in the Court of Appeals *577states the proper aim of 302.4(4). However, he concluded that "the portion which Firestone was permitted to introduce was not 'relevant’ within the meaning” of the court rule.
Justice Swainson adopts the analysis but not the conclusion of Justice Levin. He does not believe that "the admission of the hearsay was prejudicial in itself or reasonably could have influenced the jury by highlighting the court testimony of defendant’s expert”. This renders the alleged error harmless, he maintains.
I disagree with both conclusions. Although the trial judge proceeded on the erroneous assumption that once the interrogatory was used all parts of it were admissible, a proper result was achieved. The questions and answers which defendant had read were limited and relevant to the excerpts which plaintiffs introduced. Presenting the information imparted by responses to the first five questions prevented unfairness. To prohibit introduction of this material would have given that introduced by plaintiffs a misleading impact unwarranted by the circumstances. Defendant was entitled to demonstrate the context from which the information was derived. I perceive no error and would affirm the Court of Appeals.
Levin and J. W. Fitzgerald, JJ., did not sit in this case.