Court Opinion

ID: 9883845
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-10-06 02:22:10.236618+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:48:32.055385
License: Public Domain

FOLEY, Judge
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. It strikes me that the court’s denial of appellant’s right to cross-examine plaintiff concerning his state of mind at the time he executed the listing agreement for the condominium in February 1983, was reversible error.
Whether the appellant had unilaterally abandoned the contract or the parties had mutually abandoned the agreement was crucial to the decision. The trial court found abandonment by appellant without knowing or permitting inquiry to establish how respondent viewed the status of the condominium when he offered the same for sale in February 1983. No other property interests than respondent’s are reflected in the listing agreement of February 1983. How that came about and what it was intended to mean was material evidence that should be considered more than just a routine trial ruling. The answers on cross-examination might well have dictated different findings on abandonment. The inquiry on cross-examination should have been permitted from the standpoint of how the respondent viewed the situation in February 1983 when listing the condominium for sale and not from the standpoint of how he viewed it at the time of trial.
A new trial should be ordered. The rule followed in Minnesota is stated in Kellett v. Wasnie, 261 Minn. 440, 449-50, 112 N.W.2d 820, 826 (1962):
[Wjhere the case is close, the inclusion or exclusion of material testimony is important in balancing the respective positions of the parties. The evidence .adduced at the trial in the instant case was sharply conflicting, with each side offering evidence which, if believed by the jury, might have influenced the outcome. All admissible evidence ought to be received in order that the triers of fact may determine the outcome in justice to both sides as nearly as can be. * * * Where the case is close on the facts the rejection of competent and material evidence is reversible error.
See also Riewe v. Arnesen, 381 N.W.2d 448 (Minn.Ct.App.1986), pet. for rev. denied, (Minn. March 27, 1986).