Hicks v. Corso & Cefalu

• Decision Date: 19 March 1923
• Docket Number: 22955
• Citation: 95 So. 636,131 Miss. 659
• Parties: HICKS v. CORSO & CEFALU
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

95 So. 636

131 Miss. 659

HICKS v. CORSO & CEFALU

No. 22955

Supreme Court of Mississippi

March 19, 1923

DAMAGES. Eight hundred dollars for permanent injuries and nervous shock held inadequate.

"Where a young lady was injured in a collision between a truck and a car, occasioned by the negligence of the driver of the truck and the injuries are permanent and will always be more or less painful on account of severance of nerves and scar tissue, and where there was nervous shock, pain, and suffering, and where she was compelled to spend four hundred dollars for medical treatment and hospital bills, a verdict for eight hundred dollars is inadequate and will be set aside, and a new trial awarded as to the amount of the damages.

HON. D M. GRAHAM, Judge.

APPEAL from circuit court of Harrison county, HON. D. M. GRAHAM Judge.

Action by Ivy Hicks against Corso & Cefalu. From the judgment rendered, the plaintiff appeals. Reversed and remanded.

Judgment reversed, and cause remanded.

Mize &amp Mize for appellant.

Appellant is entitled to damages in such an amount as is fair, reasonable and just, under the evidence, to compensate her for her injuries. One of the elements of damage is the amount of her bill for doctors' services, nurses' fees, hospital fee, proximately caused by her injuries. This, as shown by her testimony, is at least four hundred dollars. The other elements are the amount of physical pain and mental suffering she had already suffered from her injuries and her future pain and suffering from said injuries and any permanent injury sustained.

That she suffered greatly from said injuries cannot be denied. See her testimony and that of Dr. Parker and Dr. Gay, as indicated by the record pages hereinbefore given. She is a young lady, and was badly scarred and disfigured and permanently injured. After the deduction of the four hundred dollars she paid out for doctors' bills, nurses' and hospital fees, she has only four hundred dollars left to compensate her for her severe physical and mental suffering and permanent injury and the suffering she will undergo in the future. We say that this verdict is indeed grossly inadequate. One who knew this young lady before this accident would scarcely recognize her at the time of the trial because of her changed appearance due to her injuries.

We therefore submit, that, from the foregoing, the verdict was grossly inadequate and therefore that the court erred in not granting her a new trial on the question of damages only.

George S. Dodds, for appellee.

It has been the uniform jurisprudence of this court in actions sounding in damages not to disturb the verdict of the jury on the grounds alone of excessive or inadequate damages, unless it appears from the evidence that the verdict is so excessive or inadequate as to show that such finding of the jury was plainly produced by prejudice, or passion, or corrupt motives.

The court's attention is called especially to Hassie v. Railway, 79 Miss. 581; Miss. Cent. R. R. Co. v. Caruth, 51 Miss. 77. Also Scott v. Yazoo & M. V. R. Co., 103 Miss. 522; Whitehead v. Newton Oil & Mfg. Co., 105 Miss. 711; Murphy v. Cleveland, 106 Miss. 269.

The last three cases above cited were reversed by this court on the ground of inadequate damages but the testimony in these cases showed that greater and much more serious injuries were sustained than were suffered by the...