Scarcello v. Town of Greenwich

• Decision Date: 10 January 1941
• Citation: Scarcello v. Town of Greenwich, 127 Conn. 464, 17 A.2d 523 (Conn. 1941)
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: SCARCELLO v. TOWN OF GREENWICH et al. TROPIANO v. SAME.

17 A.2d 523

127 Conn. 464

SCARCELLO v. TOWN OF GREENWICH et al.

TROPIANO v. SAME.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

January 10, 1941

Appeal from Superior Court, Fairfield County; Edwin C. DICKENSON Judge.

Separate actions by Sam Scarcello and by Anthony Tropiano against the Town of Greenwich and others for injuries suffered in collision allegedly caused by defendants' negligence tried to the jury. From an order setting aside as inadequate a verdict for plaintiff against defendant Fitzroy in the case brought by plaintiff Scarcello, defendants appeal, and from an order denying motion to set aside verdict for plaintiff against defendant Fitzroy in the case brought by plaintiff Tropiano, plaintiff Tropiano appeals.

No error.

Lawrence S. Finkelstone, Lawrence E. Levy, and George N. Finkelstone, all of Bridgeport, for Scarcello and Tropiano.

DeLancey Pelgrift, of Hartford, and H. Allen Barton, of Greenwich, for Town of Greenwich and Fitzroy.

Argued before MALTBIE, C.J., and AVERY, BROWN, JENNINGS, and ELLS JJ.

ELLS Judge.

These two cases, arising out of the same collision, were tried together to the jury upon identical issues except as to damages. The jury awarded $160 damages for personal injuries in the Scarcello case, and the court, upon motion, set the verdict aside as inadequate. The correctness of this ruling is the only question involved in the appeal in that case. The verdict in the Tropiano case was $700. The plaintiff moved to set it aside as inadequate, and the court denied the motion. The plaintiff appealed from this denial, and also from the judgment, assigning various alleged errors in the charge.

Scarcello's medical bills were $60. Their reasonableness was not disputed. The remaining $100 was for all elements of his physical injuries, and for claimed loss of wages. The jury could reasonably have concluded that his physical injuries were not serious, but that he was at least sufficiently bruised and cut to cause the defendant's medical witness to testify, ‘ I felt it might be reasonable to allow him the two months that he said he couldn't work.’ He testified that he had been regularly employed at an average wage of $40 a week, and there was no evidence to the contrary. While the jury was not obliged to accept this testimony as wholly true, the evidence was such that they could not reasonably conclude other than that he was entitled to more than the sum allowed for injuries serious enough reasonably to keep him from his daily work for two months. A verdict for expenses only, with nothing for injury and suffering, was held to have been inadequate in Reynolds v. Maisto, 113 Conn. 405, 407, 155 A. 504.

This was one of six cases tried together. The trial judge, in his memorandum of decision, stated that two plaintiffs suffered slight injuries, and expressed the opinion that the jury confused Scarcello with other plaintiffs, and that the verdict was obviously the result of mistake. He had opportunities we do not possess. The evidence supports his conclusion. It convinces the mind that the verdict is in fact inadequate. See Quackenbush v. Vallario, 114 Conn. 652, 655, 159 A. 893. A practical test is whether the verdict is so far from fair and reasonable compensation as to shock the sense of justice. Devileskis v. Shea, 109 Conn. 526, 529, 147 A. 8. This one does.

In the Tropiano case the trial judge concluded that the verdict for $700 was not so inadequate as to justify a new trial. The major claim as to inadequacy involves the alleged loss of wages of $1,480. The medical and hospital bills were $290. The essence of the plaintiff's claim is that because the only evidence as to loss of wages was his own testimony that he had been regularly...