Baldridge v. Matthews

• Citation: 106 A.2d 809,378 Pa. 566
• Parties: BALDRIDGE v. MATTHEWS.
• Decision Date: 28 June 1954
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Pennsylvania

106 A.2d 809

378 Pa. 566

BALDRIDGE v. MATTHEWS.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

June 28, 1954

Rehearing Denied Aug. 19, 1954.

Action for criminal conversation. The Court of Common Pleas No. 5 Philadelphia County, at No. 5355 June Term, 1950, (tried in C.P. No. 4), Davis, J., rendered judgment on verdict for plaintiff, and defendant appealed. The Supreme Court, at No 85, January Term, 1953, Jones, J., held that evidence on issue of whether defendant had had intercourse with plaintiff's wife without plaintiff's consent was sufficient to support judgment for plaintiff.

Judgment affirmed.

William Bruno, Philadelphia, for appellant.

Elston C. Cole, Philadelphia, for appellee.

Before STERN, C. J., and STEARNE, JONES, BELL, CHIDSEY, MUSMANNO and ARNOLD, JJ.

JONES Justice.

In this action for criminal conversation the jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff in the sum of $10,000 composed of $7,500 compensatory and $2,500 punitive damages. The defendant filed motions for judgment n. o. v. and for a new trial, both of which motions the learned court below refused. The refusal of a new trial was conditioned on the plaintiff's filing a remittitur for so much of the verdict as was in excess of $5,000. The remittitur was duly filed and judgment was entered for the plaintiff on the reduced verdict. This appeal by the defendant followed. In addition to the lower court's refusal of the defendant's motion for judgment n. o. v., the appellant assigns here for error certain of the trial court's rulings on evidence, its refusal of a number of points for charge and portions of the charge. He also alleges that the plaintiff's attorney prejudiced the defendant's case by the use of leading questions and by improper argument to the jury, and that the verdict was excessive.

There is not a semblance of merit in the appellant's claim to judgment n. o. v. The common law has long furnished an aggrieved husband with a right of action for criminal conversation against his wife's adulterer: Antonelli v. Xenakis, 363 Pa. 375, 376, 69 A.2d 102.The gravamen of the tort is the indulgence by the offender in sexual intercourse with another's wife without her husband's consent: Antonelli v. Xenakis, supra. And, as set forth in Restatement, Torts, § 685,-‘ One who, without the husband's consent, has sexual intercourse with a married woman is liable to the husband for the harm thereby caused to any of his legally protected marital interests.’ This common law right of action in trespass for damages continues to exist in Pennsylvania; it was not abolished by the Act of June 22, 1935, P.L. 450, as amended, 48 P.S. § 171 et seq.: see Antonelli v. Xenakis, supra.

In the instant case the plaintiff, in his complaint, pleaded a prima facie case of criminal conversation and at trial adduced evidence to substantiate his averments which the defendant denied. The case was peculiarly one for the jury. As stated by the learned court below,-‘ The record is replete with corroborating facts and circumstances from which the jury could reasonably conclude that defendant did have intercourse with plaintiff's wife without his consent. To catalogue these facts would unnecessarily and unduly enlarge an already voluminous treatment of the matter.^[1]Defendant's contentions tested the credulity of the court and obviously that of the jury.’ The motion for judgment n.o.v. was, therefore properly refused.

As to the motion for a new trial, the appellant alleges trial error in seven different particulars. The learned trial judge, in the OPINION en banc, sur the defendant's after-verdict motions, adequately and correctly disposed of six of the contentions which the appellant now renews here. We shall, therefore, confine ourselves to a discussion of the one remaining contention. No useful purpose would be served by our reiterating the reasoning of the court en banc in disposing of the others.

At trial, the plaintiff, in support of his allegation that his wife and the defendant had stayed overnight in a hotel tryst sought to show that they had baggage with them when the defendant registered himself and companion as ‘ Mr. & Mrs. W. D. Miller’ . The significance of the baggage would be in its confirmation of...