Holland v. Williams

• Decision Date: 14 February 1908
• Docket Number: (No. 852.)
• Citation: 60 S.E. 331,3 Ga.App. 636
• Parties: HOLLAND. v. WILLIAMS.
• Court: Georgia Court of Appeals

60 S.E. 331

3 Ga.App. 636

HOLLAND.

v.WILLIAMS.

(No. 852.)

Court of Appeals of Georgia.

Feb. 14, 1908.

Writ of Error — New Trial — Excessive Damages—Personal Injuries.

Despite the broad discretion of the jury in assessing damages in cases of personal injury, the trial judge may grant a motion for a new trial on the general grounds, when, in his opinion, the verdict is unreasonably too large or too small; and this court will interfere with that discretion only in cases of manifest abuse.

[Ed. Note.—For cases in point, see Cent. Dig. vol. 3, Appeal and Error, § 3873.]

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Error from City Court of Statesboro; J. F. Brannen, Judge.

Action by R. M. Williams against M. M. Holland. Verdict for plaintiff was set aside as being too small, and defendant brings error. Affirmed.

See 55 S. E. 1023.

Brannen & Booth, H. B. Strange, and J. J. E. Anderson, for plaintiff in error.

Twiggs & Oliver, Deal & Lanier, and R. Lee Moore, for defendant in error.

POWELL, J. This was a suit for damages on account of an assault and battery. The jury gave the plaintiff a small verdict. He moved for a new trial on the general grounds and also for certain errors in the charge.

The Judge granted a new trial; and the defendant excepts. As the grounds of the motion for a new trial assigning errors of law are not meritorious, we conclude that the grant was upon the general grounds. The defendant, being satisfied with the amount found against him, questions the discretion of the trial judge to interfere with the finding of the jury in assessing damages.

Section 3803 of the Civil Code of 1895, which declares, "The question of damages being one for the jury, the court should not interfere, unless the damages are either so small or so excessive as to justify the inference of gross mistake or undue bias, " and the similar statement at the conclusion of section 3907, were codified from the decision of the Supreme Court in the case of Lang v. Hopkins, 10 Ga. 37. The court referred to in those sections is the Supreme Court (now also this court), and they do not have in immediate contemplation the power of the trial judge to review and approve or set aside a verdict upon a motion for a new trial. For instance, the language of that decision runs thus, in part: "As judges we are not authorized to sustitute our conjectures or apprehensions for the determination of that body on whom the law has devolved the duty of deciding, duly weighing all the circumstances of the case. * * * Judges should be very cautious, therefore, how they overthrow verdicts given by 12 men on their oaths, on the ground of excessive damages, upon a matter left so entirely to their discretion, especially where the presiding judge before whom the cause was tried, and who is presumed to have been familiar with all the facts, has refused to interfere. For this court to order a rehearing under such circumstances, it must be made manifest by the proof that the damages were 'flagrantly outrageous and extravagant.' " So, also, headnote 2 in the case of Adkins v. Williams, 23 Ga. 222, reads: "If the court trying the case does not consider the damages excessive, any other court ought to be cautious in holding them to be so." The proposition that, in cases of the character referred to in these decisions and Code sections, the jury have the right to exercise an original fair discretion according to their enlightened consciences in assessing damages is wholly sound, and exists apart from and independently of these statements,...