Court Opinion

ID: 9477257
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 06:18:31.876548+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:45:46.803149
License: Public Domain

TIMBERS, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I regret that I am unable to join in the majority’s comprehensive, innovative opinion. Since I believe that the cumulative effect of the two errors committed at trial —admission in evidence of an unpled defense and admission in evidence of surprise expert testimony — unjustly prejudiced appellant, I would reverse the judgment entered on the jury verdict and remand the case for a new trial.
(A) Evidence of Contributory Negligence of Appellant.
Rule 8(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provides:
“(c) Affirmative Defenses. In pleading to a preceding pleading, a party shall set forth affirmatively accord and satisfaction, arbitration and award, assumption of risk, contributory negligence, discharge in bankruptcy, duress, estoppel, failure of consideration, fraud, illegality, injury by fellow servant, laches, license, payment, release, res judicata, statute of frauds, statute of limitations, waiver, and any other matter constituting an avoidance or affirmative defense. When a party has mistakenly designated a defense as a counterclaim or a counterclaim as a defense, the court on terms, if justice so requires, shall treat the pleading as if there had been a proper designation.”
“If such defenses are not affirmatively pleaded, asserted with a motion under Rule 12(b) or tried by the express or implied consent of the parties, such defenses are deemed to have been waived and may not thereafter be considered as triable issues in the case.” Radio Corporation of America v. Radio Station KYFM, Inc., 424 F.2d 14, 17 (10th Cir.1970). The Supreme Court strictly enforces the rules it has prescribed. See Taylor v. Illinois, — U.S. —, 108 S.Ct. 646 (1988) (upholding sanction precluding witness from testifying where counsel had failed to comply with discovery rules).
In the instant case I would hold that the defense of appellant’s contributory negligence was waived and, accordingly, no evidence should have been admitted on the issue. The defense was never affirmatively pleaded nor was it asserted with a motion under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b). Most assuredly, it was not tried with the consent of the parties. When it appeared, due to the opening statement of appellee’s counsel, that appellee considered the defense to be an issue triable to the jury, appellant immediately moved in limine to exclude any evidence of its own contributory negligence. Specifically, appellant urged that any defense based on an alleged alteration of the packer by so-called “notching” of that piece of equipment should be excluded. After argument in chambers, the court agreed with appellant and granted the motion, stating: “A general denial ... tells the other side nothing. You [appellee] said you were going to [file an amended answer], pleading these defenses, and you didn’t do it. So you’re not going to be allowed to put on any evidence of it....” The court was eminently correct in this ruling.
Notwithstanding the ruling, however, the court permitted evidence of appellant’s contributory negligence in notching the packer *1414to permeate the entire trial, under the guise of “causation”.1 To me, the difficulty in following the lower court’s rationale is that, under its approach, contributory negligence would never have to be pled. By emphasizing the notching evidence as a break in the chain of causation, appellee succeeded in trying and submitting to the jury the improper issue of “who was negligent — Otis or Marino?’’ when the issue, as set forth clearly in the pleadings, was appellee’s negligence alone. This was error.
(B) The Surprise Expert Testimony.
Rule 26(e) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure expressly imposes a continuing duty on a person who responds to a discovery request to make seasonable supplemental responses with respect to, among other facts, “the identity of each person expected to be called as an expert witness at trial, the subject matter on which the person is expected to testify, and the substance of the person's testimony.” Fed.R; Civ.P. 26(e)(1) (emphasis added). The rule further requires a party to amend a prior response seasonably if the party “obtains information upon the basis of which ... the party knows that the response was incorrect when made”. Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(e)(2). In the instant case, the concealment of experiments, and the results thereof, performed by appellee’s expert after his deposition, which results contradicted his deposition testimony, assured a trial by ambush when the expert was permitted to testify to them.
Two weeks prior to trial appellant took the deposition of appellee’s expert, John Harcourt. At that time, when questioned regarding the possible impact of notching on the packer, Harcourt responded that he had not reached any conclusions on notching and therefore could not quantify the effect, if any. He stated that sand which had been trapped in the packer “would be enough by itself” to cause the packer to become stuck. This was precisely the con-elusion appellant had reached and, in fact, was the basis of its lawsuit.
Shortly after Harcourt’s deposition, he performed a series of experiments which allegedly demonstrated that the notching of the packer created three conditions which caused the packer to malfunction. At no time prior to the eve of trial, however, did Harcourt amend his deposition testimony to enable appellant to be put on notice of Harcourt’s findings. As soon as appellant was advised that Harcourt might testify in contradiction to his deposition testimony, appellant moved, as part of its motion in limine, to exclude such testimony. As stated above, that motion was granted. The court said:
“I’m going to sustain any objection to further testimony that might tend to enlarge upon the testimony that this witness gave at deposition, the result of any test taken since then for the reasons that you didn’t supply the other side with the results of the test or whatever, and the rules are clear that you have a continuing obligation to update the answers to interrogatories or the demand for production or whatever as new evidence that may come to light, and apparently didn’t do it in this case.”
Notwithstanding this ruling, however, appellee nevertheless was permitted to elicit testimony regarding the experiment’s results. Harcourt — having given deposition testimony which supported appellant’s case —was permitted to testify at trial that the notching caused the failure of the packer. The prejudice which redounded to appellant from this surprise testimony, for which it was unprepared, simply could not be overcome. It cast a reversible pall over the entire trial.
To summarize:
Appellant was unjustly prejudiced by the cumulative effect of the two errors in the admission of evidence regarding the notching of the packer. First, in view of appel-lee’s total failure ever to articulate an affirmative defense based on notching of the *1415packer, the evidence was erroneously admitted under the guise of causation. Second, due to the breach of the duty to supplement, it was error to permit Harcourt to testify in contradiction to his deposition testimony. The cumulative effect of these errors requires a new trial.
I respectfully dissent.

. "What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” W. Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act II, Scene ii, line 43.