La Bella v. Brown

• Decision Date: 05 May 1926
• Docket Number: No. 32.,32.
• Parties: LA BELLA v. BROWN et al. SAME v. DERR.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

133 A. 82

LA BELLA

v. BROWN et al.

SAME

v. DERR.

No. 32.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

May 5, 1926.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Hudson County.

Separate actions by Giuseppina La Bella, administratrix, etc., against Arthur H. Brown and the Mutual Casualty Co., and against Carl W. Derr. Cases tried together. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendants appeal. Reversed.

Argued October Term, 1925, before GUMMERE, C. J., and KALISCH and CAMPBELL, JJ.

Jacob Schneider, of Newark, for appellants.

Lazarus, Brenner & Vickers, of Bayonne, for respondent.

GUMMERE, C. J. These two suits were brought by the administratrix of Dimetrio La Bella to recover compensation for his death. In the act of crossing the Hudson county boulevard, in the city of Bayonne, he was knocked down and run over by an automobile operated by Derr, the defendant in the second suit; and, while lying helpless in the roadway, as the plaintiff alleged, and shortly after the happening of the original accident, he was run over by another automobile, belonging to the Mutual Casualty Company, and operated by Brown, the defendants in the first suit. He was taken to the Bayonne Hospital, and died there shortly afterward.

The averment set out in the complaint in the suit against Derr was that the death of the decedent was the proximate result of the original accident. In the suit brought against the Mutual Casualty Company and Brown the averment of the complaint was that the act of Brown in running over La Bella while lying in the roadway was the proximate cause of the latter's death.

When the cases were ready for trial, it was agreed by counsel for the plaintiff and for the respective defendants "that the two cases be tried together." This was done, and a single verdict was rendered by the jury in favor of the plaintiff and against Derr, the Mutual Casualty Company, and Brown, in the sum of $12,000. This verdict was rendered in compliance with the instruction of the court, over the protest of counsel for the defendants Mutual Casualty Company and Brown, and a proper exception was taken and allowed to this judicial action. A single judgment having been entered on this verdict, the defendants have appealed from that judgment; the principal ground of appeal being directed at the alleged illegality of the judicial action just recited.

Our consideration of this ground of appeal leads us to the conclusion that the rendition of a single verdict against the several defendants in these two independent...