Court Opinion

ID: 9757076
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 22:17:50.217304+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:34.634884
License: Public Domain

Clifford, J.,
concurring. The trial court took from the jury the issue of liability and entered judgment for plaintiffs. It reasoned that the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur applied and that defendants’ failure to offer any evidence tending to rebut the permissible inference engendered by that doctrine required not simply that the case go to the jury but that plaintiffs have a judgment as a matter of law. The Appellate Division reversed, holding that
[r]es ipsa loquitur when applicable simply insures jury consideration of a plaintiff’s case, placing the onus of producing evidence on the defendant. The burden of persuasion is not however shifted; the permissible inference of a defendant’s negligence created thereby is still one for the jury, not for the court “and the jury may reject it as not of such quality as would move reasonable men to judgment in favor of the tendered hypothesis, even when there is no explanation by the defendant.” Kahalili v. Rosecliff Realty, Inc., 26 N. J. 595, 606 (1958).
I agree entirely with the Court’s conclusion that in the case before us there was direct and uncontradicted evidence *311of negligence in addition to that which produced the inference arising from the res ipsa rule and consequently there was no genuine issue of fact as to defendants’ negligence or the relationship thereof to plaintiffs’ injuries and damages. Had the sole proof of negligence been that generated by the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur, I would affirm the Appellate Division on the liability issue. While Justice Sullivan’s opinion for the Court does not address that proposition directly, I do not read the opinion as posing any conflict with the above-quoted statement of law. Hence, I concur.
Clifford, J., concurring in the result.
For reversal — Chief Justice Hughes and Justices Mountain, Sullivan, Pashman, Clifford, Schreiber and Handler — 7.
For affirmance — None.