Court Opinion

ID: 9453079
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 18:01:43.948888+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:33:29.897958
License: Public Domain

SWYGERT, Circuit Judge
(dissenting) .
I agree with the majority that the Government’s requested instruction with regard to recent sales of similar properties was properly refused by the district court. By stating that “sales constitute the market” and telling the jury that it must reject sales “as lacking in comparability before * * * turn[ing] to other means of determining market value”, the instruction mandated the jury to exclude other competent evidence from consideration.
The district judge erred, however, in not giving a proper instruction on the subject of recent comparable sales. Because his attention was directed to the subject by the refused instruction, the judge’s duty went further than simply to refuse to give the instruction as drafted. The obligation of a trial court to properly and adequately instruct the jury on the law applicable to a case is not discharged merely by the granting or refusing of requested instructions. The court is obligated to recast an improper request so that it is unobjectionable if, in the light of the evidence which has been introduced, the subject matter of the request is a necessary element of the instructions as a whole.
There can be no question but that, in view of the evidence produced and the instruction tendered, the Government in this case was entitled to an instruction to the general effect that evidence of recent sales of similar parcels furnishes a reasonable, even a desirable, basis for determining the fair market value of condemned land.
I would reverse and remand for a new trial.