Court Opinion

ID: 9461265
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:10:11.045735+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:36:58.543311
License: Public Domain

McCREE, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
I agree that the district court correctly declined to submit to the jury the claim of violation of the Federal Safety Appliance Act, 45 U.S.C. § 1 et seq. because there was no evidence that the defective brake was in any respect a causal factor in appellant’s injury. Since we determine that the defective brake played no part in causing the injury, I find it unnecessary and erroneous to state, as does the majority opinion, that “The defec*272tive brake was [not] a contributory proximate cause of Black’s injury.” (Emphasis added). Coray v. Southern Pacific Co., 335 U.S. 520, 69 S.Ct. 275, 93 L.Ed. 208 (1944), makes it clear that railroads shall be responsible for injuries to their employees “resulting in whole or in part” from defective appliances, and Rogers v. Missouri Pacific Railroad Co., 352 U.S. 500, 77 S.Ct. 443, 1 L.Ed.2d 493 (1957), makes it clear that in adopting the language “resulting in whole or in part”, the Congress intended to depart from the language of proximate causation because it was dissatisfied with the common-law duty of the master to his servant. See also Hausrath v. New York Central Railroad Company, 401 F.2d 634 (6th Cir. 1968).1
Although I agree that no error was committed in not submitting the defective brake issue to the jury, I would hold that it was prejudicial error to permit defendant’s counsel, on cross-examination, to ask appellant, over objection, whether he was the plaintiff in a suit filed in the Common Pleas Court of Stark County, Ohio, against the owner of the premises upon which he was injured. The majority opinion suggests that because the objection was untimely, because no motion to strike the answer was made, and because appellant’s counsel established that the appellant had received no money from Republic Steel, no prejudicial error occurred. It views the question as an attempt to elicit an admission that appellant was claiming “that another corporation contributed, at least in part, to his injury.”
I do not regard the objection as untimely.
The relevant portion of the transcript is as follows:
By Mr. Wright:
Q. Mr. Black, are you the plaintiff in a case that is filed in the Stark County Court of Common Pleas here in Ohio against the Republic Steel Corporation arising out of this same accident ?
A. Yes sir.
MR. HONTAS: Note an objection in the record.
THE COURT: The objection shall be overruled.
Q. And you are making a claim in that case against Republic Steel Corporation for the same damages and injuries that you are claiming in this case?
MR. HONTAS: Note an objection in the record.
THE COURT: The objection shall be overruled.
It is clear that an objection was made before the jury was informed that the case in the Stark County Court of Common Pleas was for the same injuries for which damages were sought in this case. Rule 46 2 of the Rules of Civil Procedure does not require the making of a formal exception to a ruling to preserve an error for review. Also, since the court permitted an answer over objection, appellant’s counsel should not be faulted for trying to soften the impact of the error.
*273Although the admission of an attorney, as in a pleading, may come in as an adopted admission of his client, the statement must be not only authorized but also relevant. Relevance means having a tendency to prove any material matter, and if the relationship between the evidence and the matter to be proved is very slight but its impact is highly prejudicial, it should be excluded. United States v. Craft, 407 F.2d 1065, 1069-1070 (6th Cir. 1969). Here, the material matter is whether the injury resulted in whole or in part from appellee’s negligence. If appellant contended that ap-pellee’s negligence was the sole cause of his injury, the claim that someone else was responsible would be contradictory of his claim against appellee. However, even in a common-law negligence action, there can be more than one proximate cause of an injury, and claims against several putative tortfeasors would not be mutually exclusive nor inconsistent. A fortiori, the claim here that the negligence of the owner of the premises was a proximate cause of the injury does not contradict appellant’s claim that his employer’s “negligence played any part, even the slightest, in producing the injury . . for which damages are sought.” Rogers v. Missouri Pacific Railroad Co., supra, 352 U.S. at 506, 77 S.Ct. at 448.
Nevertheless, its impact on a jury, at that point uninstructed, is highly prejudicial because it insinuated that Black either was making inconsistent claims or did not know who was responsible for his injury. Its impact is as devastating as would be the revelation that appellant had been paid for his injury by the. proceeds of an insurance policy. Yet, evidence of this fact would also be irrelevant and clearly reversible error if admitted over objection.
I do not regard the admission of irrelevant and highly prejudicial evidence as within the discretion of the district court. I regard it as error that cannot be dismissed as harmless. I would reverse and grant a new trial.

. Although the Supreme Court in Carter employed the language quoted in the majority opinion, a careful reading of that case and of the opinion in Coray demonstrates that evidence that a defendant’s breach is a “contributory proximate cause” of an injury is a sufficient but not necessary predicate for submission of the case to a jury. On the contrary, the Court made clear in both Carter and Coray that proof of any relationship, however slight, between the defendant’s negligence and the plaintiff’s injury permits submission of the case to a jury.

. Formal exceptions to rulings or orders of the court are unnecessary; but for all purposes for which an exception has heretofore been necessary it is sufficient that a party, at the time the ruling or order of the court is made or sought, makes known to the court the action which he desires the court to take or his objection to the action of the court and his grounds therefor; and, if a party has no opportunity to object to a ruling or order at the time it is made, the absence of an objection does not thereafter prejudice him.