Stith v. St. Louis Public Service Co.

251 S.W.2d 693, 363 Mo. 442
CourtSupreme Court of Missouri
DecidedOctober 13, 1952
Docket42697
StatusPublished
Cited by81 cases

This text of 251 S.W.2d 693 (Stith v. St. Louis Public Service Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Stith v. St. Louis Public Service Co., 251 S.W.2d 693, 363 Mo. 442 (Mo. 1952).

Opinions

[445]*445LOZIER, C.

Action for damages for personal injuries. Plaintiff had a verdict and judgment for $25,000. Defendant filed its alternative motion for judgment or a new trial [695] tinder Sec. 510.290. (Unless otherwise indicated all statutory references are to RSMo 1949, V. A. M. S.) The trial court ordered a $7500 remittitur, overruled defendant’s motion for judgment, overruled’ defendant’s new trial motion "in all respects,” and, alternately if plaintiff failed [446]*446to remit, sustained defendant’s new trial motion on Specification 6 (that the verdict was excessive) and overruled the motion “as to all other particulars.” Upon plaintiff’s refusal to remit, the trial court ordered a new trial on the damages issue only. Both parties appealed.

We must first determine each party’s right of appeal. “The right of appeal is purely statutory and does not exist where not given by statute.” Koplar v. Rosset, 360 Mo. 1201, 233 S. W. 2d 1, 5. The.pertinent statutes are: the provisions of Sec. 512.020 providing for appeals “from any final judgment in the case” or “from any order granting a new trial”; Sec. 510.330 authorizing the trial court to grant a new trial to “all or any of the parties and on all or part of the issues.”

“For the purposes of an appeal a judgment must be a final judgment and it must ordinarily dispose of all parties and all issues in the'case.” Deeds v. Foster, (Mo.) 235 S. W. 2d 262, 265. Here, there was no final judgment against defendant from which it could appeal. See Bailey v. Interstate Airmotive, 358 Mo. 1121, 219 S. W. 2d 333, 335. Construing’ Secs. 510.330 and 512.020 together, we believe that a trial court may, by an appropriate order, make the judgment final as to any party as to whom, or on any issue on which, no new trial is ordered; and that any'party aggrieved by such a final judgment is entitled to appeal therefrom. (As to appealability of a separate final judgment entered upon a verdict where a separate trial of a claim, as distinguished from an issue, is ordered, see: Supreme Court Rule 3.29; 2 Carr, Mo. Civ. Proc., Sec. 860.)

But where, as here, the trial court does not enter such an order and grants a new trial as to less than all parties or on less than all issues, the previously-entered-and-later-partially-set-aside- judgment cannot become final. The effect of the instant order was to set aside portions of the judgment (those fixing the amount of plaintiff’s damages) and to leave that issue entirely undisposed of; and to make the other portions (those relating to defendant’s liability) interlocutory only. This was necessarily an interlocutory judgment — rather, an interlocutory order (see Barlow v. Scott, (Mo.) 85 S. W. 2d 504, 519) — as to any party as to whom, or on any issue on which, the new trial was not granted. And such judgment, nonfinal as to all parties and on all issues, is not appealable. Webster v. Sterling Finance Co., 351 Mo. 754, 165 S. W. 2d 688; White v. Sievers, 359 Mo. 145, 221 S. W. 2d 118.

The order first overruled defendant’s after trial motion to set aside the verdict and judgment and for judgment in accordance with defendant’s trial motion for a directed verdict. The overruling of such an after trial motion is not appealable. Bailey v. Interstate Air-motive, supra.

Had defendant been granted a new trial on all issues, defendant would have had no right of appeal. Vendt v. Duenke, (Mo. App.) [447]*447210 S. W. 2d 692, 699-700. See 2 Carr, Mo. Civ. Proe., See. 1184, 1949 Pamphlet, p. 53. Conversely, defendant could have appealed from a judgment entered on the jury’s verdict for plaintiff, if its new trial motion had been overruled in its entirety. Bailey v. Interstate Airmotive, supra.

In language, the trial court’s order “sustained defendant’s motion for a new trial as to the measure of damages only, on Specification 6, * * * overruled” the motion “as to all other particulars except as to said Specification 6, ’ ’ and ordered a new trial on the issue of damages only. Actually, the order was the overruling of defendant’s motion in its entirety and an order, on the court’s own motion, of a new trial on a single issue under Sec. 510.330. The new trial ordered was one for which defendant had not asked in its new trial motion and one which plaintiff • did not seek. Both parties appealed from the order. Sec. 512.020 provides for an appeal by an aggrieved party from “any order granting a new trial.” We construe this language as including the instant order for a new trial as to the damages issue only. [696] We hold that both plaintiff and defendant, as a party aggrieved by such order, was entitled to appeal therefrom.

Plaintiff’s assignment of error is an alleged abuse of discretion by the trial court in ordering the remittitur. Defendant says that plaintiff failed to make a submissible case and assigns error in the giving of plaintiff’s Instruction No. 2, and in the giving of “verbal instructions. ’ ’

Below, plaintiff abandoned his case as to primary negligence and went to the jury upon humanitarian negligence in failing to slacken speed.

Plaintiff was injured on the afternoon of August 23, 1949, when he was struck by defendant’s streetcar in the passenger loading zone at Broadway and Kleber. (As did most of the witnesses, we use the term “loading zone” or “zone” to mean the entire chat-surfaced area, approximately 105' by 23'.) The streetcar involved was 46' long and had an overhang of 1' 5". On the west side of the loading zone is a handrail. The zone’s east side is the west curb of Broadway. The zone has two sets of tracks. The southbound cars use the west tracks and the northbound cars the east. The east (in this instance, the “last”) rail of the northbound tracks is 22' 6" from the handrail. The tracks south of the zone are straight and level. To the south for 300'-400', there are no obstructions to the view of cither a person standing near the handrail or of the operator of a northbound streetcar.

The• evidence, viewed most favorably to plaintiff, was: Plaintiff intended to board a northbound streetcar; he stood about 2' east of the handrail talking with Johnson, who was waiting for a southbound streetcar; plaintiff was watching the northbound tracks; he first saw the northbound streetcar when it was two blocks to the south; he watched it approach until it was about 270'-300' away; he did not [448]*448hear the streetcar bell ring at any time; he started to walk across the loading zone; he walked due east at a normal speed, did not run and did not pause; he neither looked south again nor saw the streetcar again until just an instant before it struck him; as he was between the rails of the northbound tracks, he saw some friends in an automobile on Broadway, to the northeast, and waved at them; as he was stepping over the last rail, he “glanced at the streetcar, but it wasn’t any use, I couldn’t go forward fast- — east fast enough, and I couldn’t go back and so it just had me between the rails ’ ’; the streetcar struck his head, right shoulder, right side and right leg.

Plaintiff and other witnesses, including several streetcar passengers, estimated the streetcar’s speed variously between 20-45 m.p.h. Other than the streetcar operator, witnesses for both parties said that the speed was not slackened until the emergency brakes were applied, simultaneously with or an instant before the collision; and that the bell was not rung until the emergency brakes were applied.

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Bluebook (online)
251 S.W.2d 693, 363 Mo. 442, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/stith-v-st-louis-public-service-co-mo-1952.