Court Opinion

ID: 9766220
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:37:24.267624+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:20.486200
License: Public Domain

SPAETH, Judge
(dissenting):
I too agree that Rule 14(7) of the Lycoming County Rules of Court has not been superseded by the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure — although I note in passing that it is about to be. See Proposed Addition to Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure, Rule 227.1: “All post trial motions after trial by jury, including a motion for a new trial . . . shall be filed within ten (10) days after . . . verdict . . . . ” I further agree that appellant’s counsel did not comply with Rule 14(7); he should have counted the Saturday. Even so, I should vacate and remand with instructions.
The complaint is for strict liability. It is alleged that appellee, which manufactures aluminum ladders, supplied appellant’s employer with a defective ladder, which buckled and broke while appellant was using it, with the result that appellant suffered permanent injuries entailing medical expenses of some $6,700 and loss of wages of some $7,000. With no transcript, we only know that the jury returned a verdict for appellee.
Appellant’s motion for new trial assigns nine specific errors (Assignments Nos. 10, 11, and 12 are general: the verdict was “against the law”, “against the evidence,” and “against the charge”). Since we have no transcript we cannot appraise any of these. However, some at least sound as though they might raise issues of substance. No. 1, for example, reads: “The learned Judge erred in allowing the Defendant to file an Answer to Plaintiff’s Complaint the day of trial.” No. 4 reads: “The learned Judge erred in his charge to the jury in categorizing Defendant’s witnesses’ testimony as showing Plaintiff’s version of the accident to be a physical impossibility.” And *494No. 5 reads: “The learned Judge erred in refusing to charge the jury on the doctrine of agency.”
We have no explanation from the lower court, only its order: “AND NOW, August 8, 1974, the Motion for a New Trial having been filed late, the Motion is hereby denied.” Lacking any explanation, I read this as saying, “the Motion is hereby denied only because it ivas one day late and without consideration of the merits.”
The majority says that “it wás within the lower court’s province to dismiss the motion for untimeliness.” At 378. I am sure this means that “it was within the lower court’s discretion to dismiss the motion . . . . ;” no court’s province includes arbitrary action. I therefore read the majority’s opinion as holding that the lower court did not abuse its discretion.
If it appeared that the lower court had exercised its discretion, we should have to decide whether there had been an abuse. What appears, however, is that the lower court refused to exercise its discretion, rather enforcing the rule in a mechanical way.
To some extent — and this makes the case difficult — this is the fault of appellant’s counsel: they only argued that they had complied with Rule 14(7); they did not argue that even if they had not complied, the court should in its discretion excuse them and hear the motion for new trial. In my view, however, this mode of argument did not permit the court to refrain from exercising its discretion; a judge is not a judge if he does not try to be fair. In addition, the judge must explain his decision, for the parties must see that he has tried to be fair or his decision will command no respect. See Commonwealth v. Riggins, 232 Pa.Super. 32, -, 332 A.2d 521, 524 (1974) (dissenting opinion) (allocatur granted August 15, 1975 at No. 40 Jan. Term 1976).
In my opinion, therefore, the order of the lower court should be vacated and the record remanded with instruc*495tions that the lower court decide whether in the sound exercise of its discretion the motion for new trial should be heard, and that it file an explanatory opinion.