People v. La Macchia

• Decision Date: 15 December 1953
• Citation: 264 P.2d 15,41 Cal.2d 738
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: PEOPLE v. LA MACCHIA et al. S. F. 18835.

Page 15

264 P.2d 15

41 Cal.2d 738

PEOPLE v. LA MACCHIA et al.

S. F. 18835.

Supreme Court of California, In Bank.

Dec. 15, 1953.

Robert E. Reed, Sacramento, Holloway Jones, Jack M. Howard, Roger Anderson and Edward L. Doyle, San Francisco, for appellant.

J. Oscar Goldstein, P. M. Barceloux, Burton J. Goldstein and Golstein, Barceloux & Goldstein, San Francisco, for respondents.

EDMONDS, Justice.

For the purpose of constructing a freeway, the state is condemning certain land bordering the presently existing highway, which is to be widened. Along each side of the freeway there will be a fence cutting off access to it except through 20-foot openings at certain points.

There are five parcels of land involved in the state's appeal from judgment awarding damages to the owners. These parcels have a frontage on the present highway of from 260 to 5000 feet. On the land having the 5000-foot frontage, there are to be three 20-foot openings in the fence at convenient points. One 20-foot opening is to be provided for each of the other parcels. The land to be taken for inclusion in the freeway ranges from less than one foot to 60 feet in width. The area of four of the parcels varies from 10 to 38 acres; the largest one has 1245 acres.

The experts called by the state and those who testified for the owners placed substantially the same values on the land taken. However, they differed markedly on severance damages. That was occasioned principally by a difference of opinion as to the highest and best use of the land along the highway, which was being used for agricultural purposes with the usual improvements related to farming and fruit growing. The state's witnesses based their opinion as to the amount of severance damages primarily upon the loss of agricultural utility and loss of convenience of agricultural operations for 20 feet from the freeway fence, with certain allowances for rearrangements of existing improvements. The owners and their experts testified that at least a portion of the land presently is adaptable and suitable for commercial development but cannot be used for such purpose with the restricted access planned by the state.

According to the state, the severance damages are grossly excessive, and were allowed because of errors in evidentiary rulings and the instructions. The property owners maintain that the rulings and instructions were correct, and in any event not prejudicial.

One of the issues is whether the trial court erroneously and prejudicially curtailed the state's cross-examination of the property owners' witnesses. 'The field of inquiry in cross-examination for the purpose of testing the credibility of a witness and the weight of his testimony is so extensive that the trial court must be given a wide discretion in order to keep such examination within reasonable bounds; otherwise the trial of cases would be overlong. When an appellate court is called upon to decide whether such discretion has been abused, the inquiry is whether a sufficiently wide range has been allowed to test such credibility and weight rather than whether some particular question should have been allowed.' East Bay Mun. Utility Dist. v. Kieffer, 99 Cal.App. 240, 261, 278 P. 476, 279 P. 178, 179. The state is complaining of seven rulings in some 240 pages of the cross-examination of three experts. No useful purpose would be served by stating the specific questions which, it is claimed, should have been permitted, for each is peculiar to the circumstances of this case. The record shows that the state's objections are not well taken. The trial judge allowed wide latitude in the cross-examination of the witnesses, and in bringing certain lines of inquiry to a close there was no abuse of discretion.

The state's second contention is that the trial court erred in admitting evidence relating to an offer to purchase a portion of the property owned by Ercole and Rafaella Pelliccione. Upon direct examination Ercole Pelliccione testified that he valued his property before the taking at $105,000. Asked the 'reason for that opinion', he stated, 'The reason is the frontage it's almost 700 feet I had on Monterey Road, that is all business property. The people, they asked me in 1947, they wanted to buy it.' The state interposed an objection upon the grounds of irrelevancy and incompetency, which the trial court overruled. Pelliccione continued: 'In 1947 I was contacted by some people, they wanted to buy one acre right there where the big oak tree was, to build a motel, and they offered me $7,000. * * *'

This answer placed before the jury testimony which may not be elicited upon direct examination. The long established rule in this state is that witnesses 'cannot, upon the direct examination, be allowed to testify as to particular transactions, such as sales of adjoining lands, how much has been offered and refused for adjoining lands of like quality and location, or for the land in question, or any part thereof, or how much the * * * (condemning party has) been compelled to pay in other and like cases notwithstanding these transactions may constitute the source of their knowledge'. Central Pac. R. R. Co. of California v. Pearson, 35 Cal. 247, 262. The courts have neither deviated nor retreated from this rule. City of Los Angeles v. Hughes, 202 Cal. 731, 736, 262 P. 737; In re Estate of Ross, 171 Cal. 64, 65-66, 151 P. 1138; Atchison, T. & S. F. Railway Co. v. Southern Pac. Co., 13 Cal.App.2d 505, 512, 57 P.2d 575; Hibernia Sav. & Loan Soc. v. Ellis Estate Co., 132 Cal.App. 408, 411, 22 P.2d 806; City of Los Angeles v. Deacon, 119 Cal.App. 491, 493-494, 7 P.2d 378; Merchants' Trust Co. v. Hopkins, 103 Cal.App. 473, 478-479, 284 P. 1072.

In an early case this court pointed out that to allow evidence of particular transactions to be presented on direct examination would open up each transaction as a side issue and the investigation would be rendered interminable. Central Pac. R. R. Co. of California v. Pearson, supra, 35 Cal. at page 262. Upon cross-examination, however, such evidence is admissible for the sole purpose of discrediting the opinion of the witness, Central Pac. R. R. Co. of California v. Pearson, supra, 35 Cal. at page 262; Reclamation Dist. No. 730 v. Inglin, 31 Cal.App. 495, 500, 160 P. 1098; Los Angeles Gas & Elec. Corp. v. Etienne, 83 Cal.App. 645, 647, 257 P. 123, but it may not be considered for the purpose of fixing the value of the land in dispute. In re Estate of Ross, supra, 171 Cal. at page 66, 151 P. at page 1139; Reclamation Dist. No. 730 v. Inglin, supra, 31 Cal.App. at page 500, 160 P. at page 1100.

The owners assert, however, that evidence of an offer to purchase the property desired by the state may be presented upon direct examination as a reason for the opinion of the witness. It is clear that one who has given his opinion as to value of certain property may, upon direct examination, state the reasons upon which it rests. Long Beach City High School Dist. of Los Angeles County v. Stewart, 30 Cal.2d 763, 773, 185 P.2d 585, 173 A.L.R. 249. But the facts stated as reasons do not become evidence in the sense that they have independent probative value upon the issue as to market value. Thornton v. City of Birningham, 250 Ala. 651, 35 So.2d 545, 7 A.L.R.2d 773; 32 C.J.S., Evidence, § 521, page 219. Instead, they serve only to reinforce the judgment of the witness, that is, they go to the weight to be accorded his opinion. See Long Beach City High School Dist. of Los Angeles County v. Stewart, supra, 30 Cal.2d at page 773, 185 P.2d at page 590. As said in Peirson v. Boston Elevated Railway, 191 Mass. 223, 77 N.E. 769: '(T)here is no right to put in evidence of matters which are incompetent as substantive evidence for the purpose of fortifying the opinion of an expert witness, even though they are offered under the guise of the reasons for his opinion, and even though they might properly have been admitted on cross-examination to test and diminish the weight to be given to his opinion.' 191 Mass. at pages 233-234, 77 N.E. at page 773. The rule is similarly expressed in United States v. 25.406 Acres of Land, 4 Cir., 172 F.2d 990, 993, and Nichols states it in substantially the same language. 5 Nichols on Eminent Domain, 3d Ed., § 18.45(1), p. 181.

The general rule which permits a witness to state the reasons upon which his opinion is premised may not be used as a vehicle to bring before the jury incompetent evidence. To so open up the inquiry would create a disastrous break in the dike which stands against a flood of interminable investigation. Upon direct examination, a witness never should be allowed to go into the details of particular offers for the property being condemned or specific sales or transactions in connection with other property. Reclamation Dist. No. 730 v. Inglin, supra, 31 Cal.App. at page 500, 160 P. at page 1100.

The property owners urge that a distinction must be made between a witness such as Pelliccione, who is an owner of one of the properties being taken by the state, and the witness who testifies as an expert. They argue that the scope of the direct examination of the expert is more limited than that of a property owner. However, there is no logical ground for any such distinction. 'All that is necessary to be shown to entitle a witness to give an opinion is to show 'that he has some peculiar means of forming an intelligent and correct judgment as to the value of the property in question * * * beyond what is presumed to be possessed by men generally. '" Spring Valley Water-Works v. Drinkhouse, 92 Cal. 528, 534, 28 P. 681, 683. The usual expert is qualified by showing his familiarity with the property and with other property in the neighborhood, his experience in the business, his familiarity with the state of the market and of sales of similar property in the vicinity. In re Estate of Ross, supra, 171 Cal. at pages 66-67, 151 P. at page 1139. A property owner, on the...