Southern Grocery Stores Inc. v. Kelley

194 S.E. 234, 57 Ga. App. 37, 1937 Ga. App. LEXIS 544
CourtCourt of Appeals of Georgia
DecidedNovember 16, 1937
Docket26271
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 194 S.E. 234 (Southern Grocery Stores Inc. v. Kelley) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Southern Grocery Stores Inc. v. Kelley, 194 S.E. 234, 57 Ga. App. 37, 1937 Ga. App. LEXIS 544 (Ga. Ct. App. 1937).

Opinion

Broyles, 0. J.

Mrs. M. E. Kelley brought suit against Southern Grocery Stores Inc. (operating under the name of “Rogers”), [38]*38alleging that as an invitee she went into a store of the defendant corporation to buy groceries; that a place on the floor of the store was “buckled up so that the edges of said boards stood up about inches higher than the general surface of the floor;” that this place had on it a “slick and oily substance” which “covered a circular area about 20 inches in diameter;” that there “was a deep dark shadow on the floor . . caused by poor lights, counters, and displays;” and that these conditions, negligently maintained by the defendant, caused the plaintiff to fall and injure her left knee in •certain described particulars. The defendant denied all material allegations of negligence and denied liability. The jury rendered a verdict for the plaintiff, and the defendant assigns error on the overruling of its motion for new trial.

Special ground 4 of the motion for new trial complains that the court erred in admitting, over objection, evidence that the floor of defendant’s store where plaintiff fell had been repaired shortly after plaintiff’s fall. The plaintiff testified that she lived just around the corner from the defendant’s store; that while she was ill as a result of this fall she could hear hammering in the store while the floor was being repaired; that when she got out, more than a month after her injury, she saw that the floor had been repaired; that the defendant started the repairs “the day after” she was hurt, “and in a very short time after that they replaced the whole floor.” The ground is without merit, for the reason that the evidence was not admitted as alleged in the ground. On the contrary, the ground itself shows that the evidence was finally ruled out. In reply to counsel’s objection to the evidence, the court first said, “If it was repaired shortly after it might be admissible,” but, after the evidence in this respect was completed, the court unqualifiedly ruled it all out. The following rulings of the court, as shown by the ground, show that the evidence was finally ruled out: “In view of this testimony I rule out about the repairs. She says it was more than a month before she was down there, and I rule [oui] evidence about the floor being repaired; and gentlemen [of the jury] you will not consider that evidence, as I understand from the evidence she was laid up a month or more, and she could not know about the repairs. . . Something that happened when she was in bed. I don’t think she could testify. . . Hammering would not be sufficient to prove the facts. . . Gentlemen of the [39]*39jury, you axe not to be influenced by cmy testimony of this witness as to repairs she may have testified about, and you are not to be influenced in any way, and do not consider it in arriving at your verdict.” (Italics ours.) Eegardless of what the judge said as to the admissibility of evidence of repairs made shortly 'after the fall of plaintiff, he finally ruled out all the evidence as to the repairs. Moreover, in the next ground of the motion for new trial, counsel for the plaintiff in error admits that the court instructed the jury that evidence as to the repairs had been ruled out.

Ground 5 of the motion avers that the court erred in refusing to declare a mistrial because counsel for the plaintiff, in the presence of the jury, argued, in effect, that the floor of the defendant’s store at the place where the plaintiff fell was later repaired by putting therein a new floor at that point. The ground shows that “the court thereupon instructed plaintiff’s counsel not to argue or mention this evidence, and instructed the jury not to consider this argument as the evidence had been ruled out.” (Italics ours.) The argument was not so prejudicial as to demand a declaration of mistrial; especially so where the court ordered counsel not to argue or mention such evidence, and instructed the jury not to consider the argument. Indeed, the instruction of the court was calculated to impress upon the jury the fact that all evidence as to repairs had been ruled out, and that they should not consider the same in arriving at their verdict.

The court did not err, as alleged in ground 6, in permitting the plaintiff’s husband to testify that when he went to the store about seven o’clock on the night of the injury, and about two hours after the injury, there were places on the floor that were buckled, that it was dark when he went down there, and that there was something smeared up on the floor. While it was dark when plaintiff’s husband went there, there is no evidence that it was dark in the store, but, on the contrary, the store was open and people were in there, and presumably the store was lighted up. Moreover, before the plaintiff’s husband examined the floor he asked where his wife had fallen. The evidence was material to the issues raised by the pleadings and the evidence, since five witnesses for the defendant testified that the floor was not slippery or buckled at the time and place the plaintiff fell.

Ground 7 alleges that the verdict is excessive. There was ample [40]*40evidence to show that the injury to the plaintiff’s knee is painful and permanent, and that it has already lasted three or four years. Witnesses testified that plaintiff’s knee made a grating noise when she walked, and this was demonstrated in the presence and hearing of the jury. Dr. Charles E. Hancock, assistant surgeon for the Southern Eailroad, who treated the plaintiff, testified in part as follows: “Her kneecap was torn loose, and then she had an injury to the sacrum, just above the junction of the backbone and pelvic bone. I think the injury she had to her knee is permanent. I think she will be crippled in that knee as long as she lives. As to the treatment for an injury of that kind, there would not be very much you could do for it except put a brace on it. I have seen quite a number of those cases, and you don’t get much good results from the healing of them. About the best thing you can do for them is to use a mechanical brace of some kind. . . The chances are she will have qmle a lot of pain the rest of her life.” (The plaintiff’s knee is exhibited to the jury.) “You ask me to put my finger on that muscle. In my opinion it has been lorn loose from the kneecap around there. . . You ask me to put my hand on the kneecap and ascertain whether or not there is a grating when she raises her leg, and there certainly is. You ask me if in my opinion I believe the condition of her knee will ever get better. I don’t believe it will. I believe she will have trouble with that knee always. I think she has been that way three or four years, it seems to me, now, since I first saw her.” (Italics ours.) There was evidence that other doctors had also treated the plaintiff sin,ce her fall in the defendant’s store, and that she suffered great pain with her knee. She testified: “Nobody on earth could begin to tell the pain I have had. I have not been able to sleep at night; the only way I can sleep any is to have my left foot hanging off the bed. I have to let it hang off the bed, or if I move my foot it wakes me and I have to move, and the only rest I can get is to have my left foot hanging out over the bed and sleep on my back; that is the only way in the world I can sleep.” In the light of the foregoing and other evidence as to the extent of the injury, coupled with the fact that the plaintiff has written off $3000 from the verdict, thus reducing it to $7000, we can not say that the verdict is excessive.

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

Related

Rackard v. Merritt
152 S.E.2d 701 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1966)
McDaniel v. State
38 S.E.2d 697 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1946)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
194 S.E. 234, 57 Ga. App. 37, 1937 Ga. App. LEXIS 544, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/southern-grocery-stores-inc-v-kelley-gactapp-1937.