Court Opinion

ID: 9626777
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 08:23:46.525179+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:12:48.113720
License: Public Domain

WYNN, Judge,
dissenting.
I concur with that portion of the majority opinion that reverses the trial court’s denial of Callaway’s motion for directed verdict and remands with instructions to vacate the judgment against Callaway. However, because I find that the jury’s finding of Dr. Rivera-Ortiz as negligent is inconsistent with their award of only one dollar in nominal damages to Ms. Hughes, I would likewise reverse the trial court’s denial of Ms. Hughes’s Rule 59 motion for a new trial. I therefore respectfully dissent in part.
As noted by the majority, the question of Dr. Rivera-Ortiz’s negligence is not before us on appeal; the jury returned a verdict finding him negligent, and that verdict remains undisturbed. Our sole question is to determine whether Ms. Hughes is entitled to a new trial under North Carolina Rule of Civil Procedure 59(a)(6), which allows a new trial to be granted on the grounds of “[m]anifest disregard by the jury of the instructions of the court” or “[e]xcessive or inadequate damages appearing to have been given under the influence of passion or prejudice.” N.C. Gen. Stat. § 1A-1, Rule 59(a)(5), (6) (2005). Thus, the only facts relevant to our inquiry are those that pertain to Ms. Hughes’s alleged damages as a result of Dr. Rivera-Ortiz’s negligence, as found by the jury.
Our state Supreme Court has indicated that a court “must set aside [a] verdict in its entirety and award a new trial on all issues” when an award of damages to a plaintiff is “grossly inadequate, so as to indicate that the jury was actuated by bias or prejudice, or *225that the verdict was a compromise^]” Robertson v. Stanley, 285 N.C. 561, 569, 206 S.E.2d 190, 195-96 (1974) (quotation and citation omitted). Moreover:
Under such circumstances, with the evidence of pain and suffering clear, convincing and uncontradicted, it is quite apparent that the verdict is not only inconsistent but also that it was not rendered in accordance with the law. Such verdict indicates that the jury arbitrarily ignored plaintiffs proof of pain and suffering. If the ... plaintiff was entitled to a verdict against defendant by reason of personal injuries suffered as a result of defendant’s negligence, then he was entitled to all damages that the law provides in such case.
Id. at 566, 206 S.E.2d at 193-94 (emphasis in original).
When instructing the jury in the instant case, the trial court informed them that, if they found that Dr. Rivera-Ortiz had injured Ms. Hughes through his negligence, Ms. Hughes was “entitled to recover nominal damages even without proof of actual damages[]” and would also be entitled to actual damages if she “prove[d] by the greater weight of the evidence the amount of actual damages proximately caused by the negligence” of Dr. Rivera-Ortiz. These instructions were a correct statement of the law; after a careful review of the record and transcript before us, I conclude that the jury’s award of only one dollar in nominal damages to Ms. Hughes was rendered contrary to the trial court’s instructions and the law.
In its judgment, the jury responded, “Yes,” to the question, “Was the plaintiff Blondale Hughes injured by the negligence of the defendant Dr. Epifanio Rivera-Ortiz?” This verdict indicates that the jury believed Ms. Hughes’s version of the events of 12 September 2002, rather than the story told by Dr. Rivera-Ortiz. As recounted by Ms. Hughes at trial, Dr. Rivera-Ortiz began her physical examination by checking her eyes, ears, mouth, and breathing, and discussed the veins on her leg. Dr. Rivera-Ortiz then asked Ms. Hughes where her husband was; she answered that she was not married and that her children’s father was in prison. He responded, “Well, where do you get sex from?” and she answered, “I don’t get sex.” Dr. Rivera-Ortiz replied, “Wouldn’t you like for somebody to come and give you sex and then leave?” and Ms. Hughes told him, “No, why would I want that. I want somebody who is going to be with me and take care of me. Why would I just want somebody to give me sex.”
*226Ms. Hughes testified that at that point, Dr. Rivera-Ortiz asked her to bend down, and she then “felt his finger inside of [her] and he said, ‘Ohhh.’ ” She went on to state:
By then I pushed myself up. He didn’t move his finger and I vaguely moved it for him when I pulled my body up from him. When I pulled my body up from him, I turned around and first I looked and his thing was just dangling right out of his pants. He grabbed me and pushed me back toward him and rubbed it in the middle of my hip. And then I said, “Please stop.” I said, “Stop. Don’t do that.” I said, “Stop.” So, by then he finally stopped. He stopped and then that is when he grabbed his note pad and said, “Write your number down and we can finish this.”
Ms. Hughes wrote her number on the pad “because [she] didn’t care because [she] wanted him out of there.” She then got dressed and left the clinic, passing Dr. Rivera-Ortiz on her way out, when “he looked at me and smiled it was like he didn’t care what [she was] [sic] going to do about what he did. He didn’t have no remorse about what he did.”
Ms. Hughes also told the jury that she had never seen a psychologist or psychiatrist prior to the 12 September 2002 incident with Dr. Rivera-Ortiz, yet had undergone extensive counseling since that time. Two of her counselors testified to the treatment she received, including several medications. Evidence was offered that Ms. Hughes was physically fit prior to the incident and actively seeking employment; indeed, her reason for the visit to Dr. Rivera-Ortiz was to have a physical for a job for .which she was applying. Although Ms. Hughes also discussed her prior criminal convictions and exposure to domestic violence with her children’s father, those events took place more than five years prior to the September 2002 incident. Ms. Hughes testified to her inability to get a job that required a physical because of her fear of visiting a doctor, as well as panic attacks, her inability to care for her children, and her medical expenses.
Given that the jury found Ms. Hughes’s evidence persuasive on the question of negligence, and that Dr. Rivera-Ortiz put on no evidence of his own at trial, I find that Ms. Hughes proved by the “greater weight of the evidence” that she suffered actual damages due to Dr. Rivera-Ortiz’s negligence, including medical expenses related to her counseling and medication, and lost wages. As such, the jury acted contrary to the trial court’s instructions in awarding Ms. Hughes only one dollar in nominal damages. Although the Robinson court noted *227the presence of “clear, convincing and uncontradicted” evidence as to pain and suffering in that case, I do not believe that language is a controlling precedent as to the standard to be applied in ruling on a Rule 59 motion. Thus, I conclude that the trial court abused its discretion by denying Ms. Hughes’s Rule 59 motion for a partial new trial on damages. I would therefore reverse.