Court Opinion

ID: 9703857
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 00:10:44.265865+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:52.342265
License: Public Domain

WOLLE, Justice
(concurring in part and dissenting in part).
I concur in divisions I, II, III, and IV of the majority opinion, but I dissent from division V in which the issue of Karl Rink-leff’s damages is deemed established by the verdict of the first jury. The first jury trial was sufficiently flawed to entitle defendant to a new trial. I believe the jury hearing the new trial should decide the single damage claim remaining by deliberating upon and resolving all the issues enveloped therein — negligence of Karl, negligence of the defendant, whether the negligence proximately caused Karl’s fall and resulting injuries, the percentage of causal negligence attributable to each, and the damages sustained by Karl as a result.
In deciding the scope of a second jury trial this court has traditionally recognized that as a general rule all issues should be retried. See, e.g., Householder v. Town of Clayton, 221 N.W.2d 488, 493-94 (Iowa 1974); In re Estate of Ring, 237 Iowa 953, 968-69, 22 N.W.2d 777, 785 (1946). Our cases have noted that the exception — a partial retrial with some issues deemed fixed by the first verdict — may only be applied “with caution.” Schmatt v. Arenz, 176 N.W.2d 771, 775 (Iowa 1970); Larimer v. Platte, 243 Iowa 1167, 1176, 53 N.W.2d 262, 267-68 (1952). Larimer suggested that a partial retrial should not be granted unless “it should appear that the issue to be tried is distinct and separable from the other issues, and that the new trial can be had without danger of complications with other matters.” Id.
*270In my view the general rule, not the exception, should apply in this comparative negligence case because the issues of liability are closely related to, and intertwined with, the damage issues. Only those damages proximately caused by defendant’s negligence will be recoverable, and the jury’s verdict establishing Karl’s damages will be reduced by the percentage of causal negligence which the jury allocates to him. I would simply remand this case for a new jury trial without giving conclusive effect to the verdict of the first jury on the issue of damages.