Kmart Corp. v. Kyles

• Decision Date: 22 May 1998
• Citation: 723 So.2d 572
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court
• Parties: KMART CORPORATION and Ray Jones v. Joyce KYLES.

723 So.2d 572

KMART CORPORATION and Ray Jones v. Joyce KYLES.

1961790

Supreme Court of Alabama.

May 22, 1998.

Opinion on Return to Remand October 30, 1998.

Rehearing Denied February 26, 1999.

David F. Daniell of Richardson, Daniell, Spear & Upton, P.C., Mobile, for appellants.

Daniel B. Feldman of Hammond, Feldman & Lehane, P.C., Birmingham; James R. Morgan, Birmingham; and Mark D. McKnight, Birmingham, for appellee.

LYONS, Justice.

Joyce Kyles sued Kmart Corporation and a former employee of Kmart, Ray Jones, alleging malicious prosecution. After two mistrials in which the juries could not reach a unanimous verdict, the jury in a third trial returned a verdict in favor of Kyles, awarding her $100,000 in compensatory damages and $100,000 in punitive damages. The trial court denied the defendants' motion for a judgment as a matter of law,¹ a new trial, or a remittitur of damages. The defendants appeal from a judgment entered on the jury verdict. We affirm conditionally.

I.

The parties to this appeal disagree on many important facts. However, because this appeal is from the trial court's denial of a motion for a judgment as a matter of law or a new trial, we are bound to view the evidence in a light most favorable to the nonmovant. Motion Industries, Inc. v. Pate, 678 So.2d 724 (Ala.1996); King Motor Co. v. Wilson, 612 So.2d 1153 (Ala.1992). Accordingly, where the evidence in the record is disputed, we present it in a light most favorable to Kyles.

One day in August 1989, a check-out supervisor at a Kmart store in the Mobile area saw two persons loading lawn chairs from the front of the store into the bed of a small red pickup truck that looked as if it had a white camper shell over the bed of the truck.² The supervisor determined that the lawn chairs had not been paid for and proceeded to inform Ray Jones, the store's loss control manager. Jones, who was also a Mobile County constable, saw a male and a female loading lawn chairs into the pickup truck. He approached the truck as it began to drive away, but the driver evaded him and the vehicle departed from the store. Jones followed in his own automobile, which bore the insignia of a constable's vehicle. Eventually, the truck pulled over and Jones questioned the driver, a woman, about the lawn chairs. He asked to see a receipt for the chairs, but the driver could not produce one. Jones then asked the driver for her driver's license. The driver showed Jones that she had a license, but did not give it to him. Jones contends that he saw the name "Kyles" on the license. Jones told the woman that she needed to follow him back to the Kmart store because the chairs had not been paid for. The woman responded by telling her male passenger to get out of the truck and unload the lawn chairs, and the man unloaded most of the chairs. The pickup truck then drove off, while Jones remained at the scene to collect the lawn chairs. Jones contends he wrote down the license plate number of the truck before it left and that the license plate was for a pickup truck registered to Robert Kyles.

Jones reported the alleged offense to the Mobile County Sheriff's Department a few days later, on August 15, 1989. The report contains a description of the female suspect that is similar to Kyles. However, the report listed the suspect as "unknown," rather than as a woman with the last name Kyles. The sheriff's department report also contains the following narrative written by a sheriff's deputy:

"Comp. [complainant] advised he witnessed 2 subjects loading lawn chairs & cushions into a red Nissan P/U, 88-89 model reg. to Robert L. Kyles, P.O. Box 394, St. Elmo, 87 Nissan P/U. Comp. chased suspect down Theodore-Dawes [Road] & stopped vehicle on Theodore-Dawes before the overpass and asked for i.d. and receipt, which she refused to comply. Later she stated she didn't have any receipt & left [the] scene. Suspect stopped again at Compac & at that time they threw some of the property out of the truck & fled [the] scene."

One evening a few days later, Jones drove to Joyce Kyles's home in St. Elmo. He wore his constable's uniform and sidearm and was accompanied by another constable. He asked to see "Mrs. Kyles, the wife of Robert Kyles who drives a red truck." Kyles was sitting with her family in the front yard of their home at the time, and she identified herself to Jones. Jones then told Kyles that she needed to go to the Kmart store to pay for the lawn chairs she had stolen. Kyles told Jones that she had not been in a Kmart store recently, had not stolen any lawn chairs, that Jones had never spoken to her before, and that she did not know what he was talking about. Jones responded by cursing at Kyles; then Kyles told him to leave, and he did.

Although Robert Kyles owned a red Nissan pickup truck at that time, it did not have a white camper shell. Instead, the truck had a roll bar and had a plywood cover over the bed of the truck that could hinge open in order for items to be placed in the bed.

Jones drove to the office of the Mobile County Sheriff's Department and met with a detective. Shortly thereafter, two sheriff's deputies, not accompanied by Jones, drove to Kyles's residence and asked if they could search the property for the lawn chairs that Jones had accused her of stealing. Kyles allowed the deputies to search her home and yard, but they did not find the chairs and left the premises.

On August 21, 1989, Jones executed an affidavit in support of an arrest warrant for Kyles. Jones's affidavit stated that Kyles and an unknown man had stolen 19 lawn chairs from Kmart and had put them in a small red pickup truck, but had thrown 14 of the chairs out of the truck after he had stopped it.

No action was taken by the sheriff's department in relation to the arrest warrant for Kyles until a day in March 1992, when she was stopped by police officers as part of a routine stop of traffic to check for driver's licenses. When one of the officers ran a computer check on her license number, he learned of the outstanding warrant and arrested her. Kyles was then transported by a sheriff's department vehicle to the county jail. At the jail, Kyles was processed and fingerprinted, and she learned that she had been arrested because of the warrant Jones had sworn out for her arrest. Kyles telephoned her husband, who went to the jail and obtained her release on bond. Kyles had spent nearly three hours in the jail.

After a preliminary hearing, the district court found probable cause to support Kyles's arrest on the felony charge of theft of property in the second degree and sent the matter to the grand jury. However, the grand jury eventually "no-billed" the charge. Kyles spent $3,900 in attorney fees defending the criminal charge. She then filed this civil action against Kmart and Jones. As noted above, this case has been tried three times, with the jury finally reaching a unanimous verdict in favor of Kyles after two mistrials. On this appeal by Kmart and Jones, our review is limited to the testimony and evidence presented to the jury in the third trial.

II.

Kmart and Jones raise several issues relating to the trial court's denial of their motion for a judgment as a matter of law, a new trial, or a remittitur of damages: (1) Did the trial court err in refusing to grant the defendants a new trial based on the defendant's claim that the trial court itself improperly questioned Jones regarding his powers as a constable and by doing so prejudiced the jury against him? (2) Did the plaintiff present sufficient evidence in support of her claim of malicious prosecution to rebut the defendants' prima facie showing of probable cause? (3) Did the trial court err in denying the defendants' motion to remit the compensatory damages award? (4) Did the trial court err in submitting the issue of punitive damages to the jury, and, if not, did the trial court err in denying the defendants' motion to remit the punitive damages award?

III.

Kmart and Jones argue that they should receive a new trial because, they say, during trial the judge questioned Jones regarding his powers as a constable and questioned him in such a manner as to prejudice the jury against the defendants. On this basis, they argue that the trial court erred in denying their motion for a mistrial and their subsequent motion for a new trial. Although the defendants acknowledge that Rule 614, Ala. R. Evid., allows a trial judge to interrogate any witness, they contend that the trial judge's action here was improper because, they say, the manner in which the judge questioned Jones left the jury with the perception that Jones, as a constable, had the power to arrest the two people in the truck for theft and escape, and in not doing so failed in his duties as a constable. The defendants further argue that the manner in which the trial judge questioned Jones left the jury with the impression that the judge did not believe Jones's testimony, and they argue that the problem was compounded by Kyles's counsel's later noting that possibility to the jury in closing arguments. Kmart and Jones note that during deliberations the jury sent a question to the judge asking whether the "constable issue" was a law issue or a fact issue, and that the judge informed them that it was a fact issue that he could not comment on. The defendants say that it is clear that the judge's questioning of Jones prejudiced Jones and Kmart in the eyes of the jury, and they argue that the trial court should have granted either their motion for a mistrial or their motion for a new trial.

In response, Kyles first notes that the trial judge has not only the right but the duty to ask questions of a witness necessary to prevent the jury from misunderstanding the evidence. Then she says that the fact that the answers given to the judge's questioning may be perceived as more favorable to one party than the other does not render the questioning improper. Kyles contends that the judge's...