Court Opinion

ID: 9454323
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 18:43:21.08307+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:34:04.454989
License: Public Domain

JOHN W. PECK, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
I concur with my brethren that the findings upon which the District Court awarded punitive damages against United States Steel Corporation are clearly erroneous, but since we are thus unanimously agreed that the findings do not even reach the level which would require us to permit them to stand under Rule 52(a) it seems to me superfluous to consider whether they could meet less exacting tests. The majority opinion indicates th'e split of authority existing among Circuits as well as that reflected in some of the decisions of this Court concerning the review of cases in which live witnesses have not been heard and where the trier of the facts considered only the identical documentary record presented to the appellate body. I see *1149no reason to here reaffirm a conclusion indicated but not discussed by a divided court in Commissioner of Internal Revenue v. Spermacet Whaling and Shipping Co., 281 F.2d 646 (6th Cir. I960), and would prefer to remain free to consider the issue in a case which does not rise to the clearly erroneous level.