Court Opinion

ID: 9532243
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:19:31.991008+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:42.708809
License: Public Domain

De MUNIZ, J.,
dissenting.
I agree with the majority that the trial court erred in denying the motion to compel production of the records. I do not agree that the error warrants reversal, and I respectfully dissent.
To begin with, the single error that defendant contends occurred1 should be put into perspective. The jury found that defendant was liable. That finding was abundantly supported by the evidence, and defendant makes no assignment of error that bears in any direct way on liability. The jury also found that defendant’s negligence caused plaintiff economic damages of more than $100,000. That finding is also not the subject of or affected by the error that defendant assigns. Finally, the jury awarded noneconomic damages of $75,000, which could have included a component for the mental distress that plaintiff alleged that the malpractice caused. The error that defendant asserts relates only to that aspect of the judgment. It is difficult to imagine a more cleanly tried case; by the losing party’s own count, only one error occurred in a case that took six days to try.
Obviously, the absence of other errors does not mean that the error that was committed should not be rectified on appeal if there is a likelihood that it might have affected the part of the result to which it relates. However, I cannot agree with the majority that there was any such likelihood, or that we are unable to affirmatively determine that there was not.
The majority ably summarizes plaintiffs harmless error argument, 134 Or App at 47-48, and it is unnecessary for me to repeat the particulars of the argument here. It suffices to say that there were many ways other than obtaining access to Dr. Drueker’s records by which defendant could *51have attempted to develop and present his theory at trial that plaintiffs emotional problems were caused, in whole or in part, by something other than the drug reaction that resulted from defendant’s malpractice. Indeed, Drucker himself was available and could have been called as a witness both at trial and for a discovery deposition. Nevertheless, by choice or inadvertence, defendant allowed the theory to lie fallow.
After describing the many avenues that defendant did not explore, the majority proceeds to accept defendant’s proposition that we cannot determine whether, if one more avenue to the same potential destination had been available to defendant, he might have found reason to develop and present the defense that an abundance of other available routes had not induced him to pursue.
Although I agree with the majority that it is impossible to say that defendant might not have found something in Drucker’s records that could have bolstered the theory, I do not think that that is the relevant inquiry. The question in connection with the harmless error issue is not whether the records could have been useful if defendant had chosen to develop and present the theory for which he sought them; rather, the question is whether the record before us demonstrates a convincing probability that defendant would not have relied on the theory at trial to any cognizable extent, no matter what evidence he might have found to support it. I think that the record makes that demonstration. For that reason, I do not agree with the majority that this appeal presents a “classic chicken-and-egg problem.” 134 Or App at 48. Rather, in my view, defendant neglected or chose not to go anywhere near the henhouse.
Although we cannot know whether that course was a . product of choice or neglect, nor does it matter to the proper disposition of the appeal which it was, a tactical decision not to make an evidentiary presentation on the theory probably would have been a good one. As I have noted, emotional distress was not the only issue in this case. Defendant fervently contested liability at trial, although he assigns no error pertaining to it here. An extensive presentation refuting the cause of one of the several types of damages that plaintiff sought could well have been regarded by defendant’s counsel as a potential distraction to the jury, and one that could have *52implied that defendant was not optimistic about prevailing on the liability issues. Moreover, direct evidence of the causes of plaintiffs emotional problems could have been perceived as difficult to produce without touching on other matters, such as plaintiffs sexual orientation, that defendant did not wish to present to the jury. Finally, counsel could more than plausibly have considered that the evidence was unnecessary: The jury was aware without any direct evidence from defendant that, independently of the consequences of the drug reaction, plaintiff was subject to other potential causes of emotional problems, including the fact that he was afflicted with a deteriorative and terminal disease.
I do not imply that the wisdom of the tactical choice, if such it was, has a direct bearing on the harmless error calculus. The point is that the inherent reasonableness of a tactical decision not to present evidence on the theory contributes to the likelihood that such a decision was made and, along with the fact that defendant did not pursue the theory through other known and available means, adds to the likelihood that nothing in the psychotherapist’s records would have altered his defensive approach.
Determining whether an error is harmless is not an exact science. It entails an assessment of probabilities, which must be guided in substantial part by intuitive responses to the circumstances of cases. Indeed, the majority opinion illustrates something akin to that proposition by holding, correctly, that there is so little likelihood that anything in the records would have provided a basis for attacking plaintiff s credibility that our remand should not extend to the liability issues on which his credibility might have bearing. I would apply a similarly realistic view to the principal issue in the appeal, and would hold that the error was extremely unlikely to have affected defendant’s failure or choice not to rely at trial on the theory he now stresses, regardless of where the evidence to support that theory might have been looked for or found.
This is a case that should be over.

 As the majority notes, defendant makes two assignments of error, but the second is redundant of the first.