Court Opinion

ID: 9849456
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:40:26.594086+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:19:25.099394
License: Public Domain

*253Justice HUSKINS dissenting.
At the fourth trial of this case the jury answered the first issue “No,” saying that Charles Edward McDonald was not injured and damaged by the negligence of defendant. Plaintiff, among other things, moved to set the verdict aside as against the greater weight of the evidence. That motion, as well as others, was denied by Judge Bailey, not on the merits but on the ground that the decision of this Court following the third trial, 293 N.C. 431, 238 S.E. 2d 597 (1977), required him to submit certain issues to the jury and to render judgment accordingly. Plaintiff then petitioned this Court for a writ of mandamus to require Judge Bailey to consider the various motions on their merits. We treated that document as a petition for certiorari and allowed it. Therefore, in actuality, the question before this Court on this appeal is whether Judge Bailey erred in refusing to consider on its merits the plaintiff’s motion to set the verdict aside.
Judge Bailey’s comments during the arguments for and against the various motions after verdict clearly indicate tha,t he acted under the misapprehension that this Court’s decision, reported in 293 N.C. 431, required him (1) to submit the issues set out in that opinion whether or not the evidence offered at the fourth trial justified submission, (2) to sign a judgment on the verdict, (3) to refuse to set the verdict aside even though it be against the greater weight of the evidence, and (4) to prohibit a peremptory instruction on any and all of the first three issues regardless of what the evidence was. For example, Judge Bailey stated to counsel: The jury’s verdict “shocks my conscience. ... I don’t see how the jury reached the conclusion to save my life. . . . The verdict of the jury shocks me but I am not going to set it aside. And the only reason on earth I’m not going to set it aside is that the Supreme Court stipulated that it would be a jury issue.” The record contains other expressions of like import.
Our decision did not repeal the Rules of Civil Procedure and it should not have impaired Judge Bailey’s common sense. If the verdict was so far out of line as to “shock” Judge Bailey’s conscience, and I think it must have been, then he should have set the verdict aside.
For the reasons stated I dissent from the majority opinion and vote to remand this case so that Judge Bailey may pass upon *254the motion to set the verdict aside in the exercise of his sound discretion. Justice is not served when unseemly verdicts are sustained on technicalities. We have said many times that where a ruling or a judgment is based upon a misapprehension of applicable law, the cause will be remanded in order that the matter may be considered in its true legal light. See Helms v. Rea, 282 N.C. 610, 194 S.E. 2d 1 (1973); Myers v. Myers, 270 N.C. 263, 154 S.E. 2d 84 (1967); Davis v. Davis, 269 N.C. 120, 152 S.E. 2d 306 (1967).