Stewart ex rel. Stewart v. Rice

Decision Date13 May 2002
Docket NumberNo. 00SC970.,00SC970.
Citation47 P.3d 316
PartiesDavid STEWART, Jr., minor, by and through his next friend and mother, Chiquita STEWART, Petitioner, v. Velma I. RICE, Respondent.
CourtColorado Supreme Court

Lloyd C. Kordick & Associates, Lloyd C. Kordick, Colorado Springs, Colorado, Attorney for Petitioner.

Patterson, Nuss & Seymour, P.C., Franklin D. Patterson, Brian C. Proffitt, Englewood, Colorado, Attorneys for Respondent.

Justice HOBBS delivered the Opinion of the Court.

The court of appeals in Stewart v. Rice, 25 P.3d 1233 (Colo.App.2000) considered juror affidavits in directing the trial court to review its previous denial of a new trial motion. We hold that Colorado Rule of Evidence 606(b) barred consideration of the juror affidavits because they did not address matters within the rule's two exceptions: extraneous prejudicial information improperly brought to the juror's attention or improper outside influence exerted upon a juror.

After the trial court discharged the jury, defense counsel obtained five juror affidavits through an investigator and then used them to support a new trial motion. Plaintiff's counsel then obtained counter-affidavits from the same five jurors, rejecting what they had said in the defense affidavits.

The case had gone to a six person jury on the issue of damages only. The trial court instructed the jury in the use of a special verdict form containing three separate lines for the entry of noneconomic, economic, and physical impairment damages. The jury returned a verdict for $696,000.00 in noneconomic damages, $440,000.00 in economic damages, and $1,136,000.00 in physical impairment damages.

The trial court read the written verdict aloud verbatim, and then polled each juror at the request of defense counsel. Each juror answered "yes" to the trial court's question, "Is that your verdict in this case?"

Defense counsel realized later that the sum of the economic and noneconomic damages amounted to $1,136,000.00, the same amount the jury had entered on the third line for physical impairment damages. Defense counsel sent an investigator to contact the jurors. He did so repeatedly. Five of the six jurors signed affidavits which defense counsel offered to demonstrate that the jury did not intend to make an award for physical impairment damages. Instead, so the defense alleged in its new trial motion, the jury meant the third line of its written verdict to state the total of its damages award. When plaintiff's counsel contacted the same five jurors, they executed counter-affidavits. These affidavits reaffirmed what the jurors had said when polled by the trial court, that the recorded verdict was theirs.

We determine that the affidavits were inadmissible under Colorado Rule of Evidence 606(b).1 Accordingly, the court of appeals should have excluded the affidavits from consideration. We reverse and reinstate the jury's verdict and the trial court's judgment.

I.

This lawsuit arose from a motor vehicle accident in Colorado Springs. The Petitioner, David Stewart ("Stewart"), the plaintiff in the trial court, was riding as a passenger in a vehicle driven by his mother, Chiquita Stewart, when a vehicle driven by the defendant, Velma Rice ("Rice"), the Respondent in this case, turned onto the street in front of the Stewarts' car and the two vehicles collided. Stewart suffered injuries to his neck, back, and nervous system and sued Rice.

The case went to the jury on the issue of damages only. Special Verdict Form B required the jury to answer two questions: "Did the plaintiff, David Stewart, Jr., incur injuries, damages or losses?" and "Was the defendant, Velma I. Rice's, negligence a cause of any of the injuries, damages or losses claimed by the plaintiff?" Because the jury answered "yes" to both questions, it proceeded to answer three additional questions regarding its award of damages in three separate categories. The jury answered each question as follows:

a. What is the total amount of damages, if any, incurred by the plaintiff for noneconomic losses or injuries, excluding any damages for physical impairment? Noneconomic losses or injuries are those losses or injuries described in numbered paragraphs 1 and 5 of Instruction 12. You should answer "0" if you determine there were none.
ANSWER: $ 696,000.00
b. What is the total amount of damages, if any, incurred by the plaintiff for economic losses, excluding any damages for physical impairment? Economic losses are those losses described in numbered paragraphs 2 and 3 of Instruction 12. In computing the amount of the economic losses incurred by the plaintiff, you must exclude those amounts you are instructed to exclude in Instruction 12. You should answer "0" if you determine there were none.
ANSWER: $ 440,000.00
c. What is the total amount of damages incurred by the plaintiff for physical impairment? You should answer "0" if you determine there were none.
ANSWER: $ 1,136,000.00

In regard to Paragraph c, the trial court instructed the jury to:

State your answer to the following questions relating to the damages incurred by the plaintiff and caused by the negligence of defendant . . . .
. . . .
c. What is the total amount of damages incurred by the plaintiff for physical impairment? You should answer "0" if you determine there were none.

No part of the court's instructions or the verdict form asked the jury to calculate or enter its award of total damages for all three categories.

Each of the jurors signed the special verdict form. Upon receiving the verdict quoted above, the trial court read it back verbatim to the jury. It then polled the jurors individually, at the request of defense counsel. Each juror answered "yes" to the trial court's question, "Is that your verdict?"

Pursuant to section 13-21-102.5, 5 C.R.S. (1998), the trial court reduced the noneconomic damages award of $696,000.00 to $250,000.00. It then totaled the amounts for the three categories of damages, calculated and added the interest owed, and entered judgment for Stewart in the amount of $2,925,640.00.2

After the trial court had discharged the jury, Rice's counsel directed a private investigator to obtain the signatures of jurors on form affidavits interpreting the jurors' intent and the meaning of the verdict they had signed. After repeated contacts, five jurors signed Rice's affidavits; the sixth juror refused to sign the affidavit.

Rice moved for a new trial on causation and damages pursuant to C.R.C.P. 59. She contested the jury's verdict on grounds that (1) it was the product of "passion, prejudice or other ill motive"; (2) "the jury acted in reckless disregard of the instructions of law given it and did not even read the verdict form and instruction 12, or if read, misperceived"; and (3) "the impairment verdict was the sum of the other two [damages categories]."

There were six jurors. To prove the jury's intent to make an award of damages different from that appearing on the special verdict form each had signed, Rice offered five juror affidavits. Three of the affidavits stated that:

The award of $1,136,000.00 for Question C was the sum of the award for Question A of $696,000.00 and Question B of $440,000.00.
We intended that our total verdict was to be the amount entered on Line "C", and did not intend that the amount on Line "C" be added to the amounts on Lines "A" and "B". We intended our total verdict to be the amount on Line "C".

The other two affidavits omitted the second paragraph.

Stewart's attorney then countered with affidavits by the same five jurors stating that the jury had come to consensus, the written verdict they signed accurately recorded their verdict, they felt pressured into signing the defense affidavits, the defense investigator had contacted them repeatedly, and the investigator had made them feel like "idiots."3 One of these jurors also signed a separate affidavit reciting that the investigator had said the jury verdict was excessive and a $50,000.00 settlement offer had been discussed between the parties before trial. The sixth juror refused to execute any affidavit.

Citing Colorado Rule of Evidence 606(b), Stewart moved to strike the defense affidavits. Stewart also filed a "Motion to Stop Jury Harassment" with affidavits of two jurors. Because the trial court did not rule on Rice's new trial motion, it was denied by operation of C.R.C.P. 59(j).

Rice appealed. She argued in her briefs to the court of appeals that the evidence did not support the economic damages award. She did not challenge the sufficiency of the evidence for the physical impairment award. Instead, referring to the amount the jury placed on the physical impairment line of its signed verdict, she contended that: "We know from the juror affidavits following trial that there was a mistake of more than $1,000,000.00 in just one line of the verdict form."

The court of appeals rejected Rice's contention that the evidence did not support the jury's award for economic damages in the amount of $440,000.00. The court of appeals rejected Stewart's cross-appeal, which alleged that Colorado's noneconomic damages cap was unconstitutional. Based on the defense affidavits, the court of appeals ordered the trial court to inquire into the jury's verdict and to consider granting a new trial. Stewart, 25 P.3d at 1237. The court of appeals affirmed the trial court's judgment in all other respects.

We reverse the judgment of the court of appeals and reinstate the jury's verdict and the trial court's judgment.

II.

We hold that CRE 606(b) barred the court of appeals from considering the juror affidavits because they did not address matters within the rule's two exceptions: extraneous prejudicial information improperly brought to the juror's attention or improper outside influence exerted upon a juror.

We proceed with our analysis by examining Colorado's common law and CRE 606(b), which codified the common law and...

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