Herbeck v. Germain

107 N.W. 901, 144 Mich. 157, 1906 Mich. LEXIS 1016
CourtMichigan Supreme Court
DecidedMay 24, 1906
DocketDocket No. 4
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 107 N.W. 901 (Herbeck v. Germain) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Michigan Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Herbeck v. Germain, 107 N.W. 901, 144 Mich. 157, 1906 Mich. LEXIS 1016 (Mich. 1906).

Opinion

Moore, J.

The plaintiff, a married woman, brought suit against the defendant to recover damages which she claims to have sustained through the negligence of defendant, while seated with her husband and mother in a Concord buggy, drawn by one horse and going in a southerly direction on Washington avenue in the city of Saginaw, and for medical attendance for which she claims to have paid from her own money. She contends the defendant negligently drove his team into the buggy in which she was riding, frightening her husband’s horse, breaking down the wheels of the buggy, and that she received personal injuries and suffered from fright and shock, so she became affected with neurasthenia. The declaration contained two counts, one charging the defendant’s negligence was gross, wanton, and willful, and brought on neurasthenia, and the other alleged the same injury, but charged plaintiff was suffering with a slight affection of the nerves at the time of the accident, which was aggravated by the injury. The defendant pleaded the general issue, and claimed he was not in fault for the injury; but, if any was received, it was the result of the carelessness of plaintiff’s husband, who suddenly turned his horse in front of the team of defendant, thus causing the accident. The plaintiff recovered a judgment for $1,000. The case is brought here by writ of error.

It is said the court erred in permitting an answer to the following question:

Q. I want to ask you one more question based upon Mr. Herbeck’s testimony and her own, Mrs. Herbeck’s testimony, in this case. I want to- ask you ;now, assuming that the woman was in a state of normal good health, good, fair, normal health, when this fright and shock occurred ; will you state whether the condition in which you found her would naturally and pathologically follow from the fright and shock she received.? ”

The objection was that it was a hypothetical question, [159]*159based on the claim that the plaintiff was a well woman at the time of the injury, when in fact she was a sick woman. The above question came after the following colloquy:

“Q. Now, doctor, assuming the fact to be that on the very day that she received this shock and injury, on that Sunday afternoon, and keeping in mind the explanation of shock and fright that I have given you and also counsel here, that you understand the whole situation and that at that time she was in a condition where all the symptoms of neurasthenia had disappeared. There was no insomnia, no pain of any kind, no bladder or liver or stomach trouble, that she improved, ate well, and was in that physical, mental and nervous condition, that her color had improved, and appetite, and strength. Assuming that now to be the condition, doctor, then I ask you whether the condition in which you found her at your examination could be accounted for or ascribed to the effect of the fright and shock which she received that day, the 12th of June ?

“Mr. Weadock: I object to that, because it does not state the fact and assumes a condition that does not exist. (Reads from Dr. Cowles’ testimony.) Dr. Cowles’ testimony shows the wpman was not a well woman, and they cannot escape it, and no expert questioning based upon the fact she was a well woman can stand under the facts of this case.

Mr. Emerick: I have not said she was a perfectly well woman. I am willing to incorporate what counsel read in the question, and then ask what fright or shock was necessary at that time to produce the condition at the end of seven months. (Question read. Further objection, and reading from Dr. Cowles’ testimony.)

The Court: I think the question assumes it was not entirely removed.

“Mr. Emerick: Put that in.

Q. Assuming, doctor, that the symptoms had all disappeared, but that there was some disease yet, or some effect yet of neurasthenia, that the woman was in a slightly nervous condition, but that the stomach — she could eat and sleep — and then take her condition when you examined her at the end of seven months; I ask you if the fright and shock she received would cause and account for the condition in which you found her when you examined her last week ?

“ A. I would say it might.”

[160]*160Then came the question upon which error is assigned.

It was the claim of plaintiff that, though she had been ill before the accident, she had fully recovered and had been housecleaning all the week before the injury, and she so testified. Her mother testified she was perfectly well before the accident. Her sister, Mrs. Leyman, where she took dinner shortly before she was hurt, so testified. Her physician testified she was apparently well. In 2 Jones on Evidence, § 373, it is said:

“ If there is no testimony in the case tending to prove the facts assumed in the hypothetical question, such question is improper. The facts must be proved or offered to be proved; and if there is no evidence to prove such facts, or if the facts assumed in the interrogatory are wholly irrelevant to the issue, the question should be excluded. The question is not necessarily to be rejected by the court although the facts assumed by counsel to be true are not proved, or although the question does not state the facts as they actually exist. The facts are generally in dispute; and it is sufficient if the question fairly states such facts as the proof of the examiner tends to establish, and fairly presents his claim or theory. It cannot be expected that the interrogatory will include the proofs or theory of the adversary, since this would require a party to assume the truth of that -which he generally denies. A question should not be rejected because it does not include all the facts, unless it thereby fails to present the case fairly.”

We think there was testimony upon which to base the question. What we have said of this assignment applies to the second assignment of error.

The fourth assignment of error relates to the putting of a question, on cross-examination, to Dr. Sample, a witness for defendant. This question was framed by incorporating in it the reading of three or four pages of testimony. It is now said the question is incoherent, that it does not assume a state of facts on any theory supported by any evidence, that it should have been reduced to writing,' citing Jones v. Village of Portland, 88 Mich. 613 (16 L. R. A. 437), Mayo v. Wright, 63 Mich. 32, and was of too great length to be retained by human [161]*161memory. It may be said of the last two suggestions that they were not made in the court below. The length of the question can be accounted for in part by the fact that while counsel was framing it, the counsel for defendant continued to object to it, because it was omitting something. We think there was testimony upon which to base the question.

A group of assignments relate to questions which, counsel say, resulted in an attempt to get before the jury the contents of medical works or illustrations from them. Whatever may have been the purpose of counsel, it did not result in getting before the jury the contents of any medical work, and while the cross-examination was very long it was invited by the attitude and the answers of the witnesses..

Error is assigned to the following questions on cross-examination of defendant:

“Q.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Earle v. Earle
95 N.W.2d 833 (Michigan Supreme Court, 1959)
O'Donnell v. Oliver Iron Mining Co.
262 N.W. 728 (Michigan Supreme Court, 1935)
Ladd v. Germain
108 N.W. 679 (Michigan Supreme Court, 1906)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
107 N.W. 901, 144 Mich. 157, 1906 Mich. LEXIS 1016, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/herbeck-v-germain-mich-1906.