Seals v. St. Regis Paper Co.
| Decision Date | 25 May 1970 |
| Docket Number | No. 45827,45827 |
| Citation | 236 So.2d 388 |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
| Parties | Johnnie B. SEALS, Father and Next Friend of Johnny Wayne Seals, a Minor v. ST. REGIS PAPER COMPANY and Harold W. Smith. ST. REGIS PAPER COMPANY and Harold W. Smith v. Johnnie B. SEALS, Father & Next Friend of Johnny Wayne Seals, a Minor. |
Cumbest, Cumbest & Shaddock, Pascagoula, for Seals.
M. M. Roberts, Hattiesburg, for St. Regis.
This is a personal injury suit filed in the Circuit Court of George County on behalf of Johnny Wayne Seals, a minor, with a demand of $50,000 actual damages and $50,000 punitive damages. There was a resulting jury verdict of $25,000. On appeal to this Court we reversed the trial court, holding that under the facts then before the Court the case was not a proper one for the authorization of punitive damages. St. Regis Paper Co. v. Seals, Miss., 211 So.2d 547 (1968).
After the case was remanded to the circuit court, the court sustained a motion of appellee over the objection of appellant to amend his declaration to charge newlydiscovered evidence and to seek actual damages in the amount of $400,000 and punitive damages in the amount of $200,000. Another jury trial resulted in a jury verdict awarding appellant $200,000 actual damages. The trial court sustained a motion for a new trial and ordered a new trial on the question of damages alone. From this order Johnny Wayne Seals appeals and appellees cross appeal.
Since the jury resolved the conflict in the evidence in favor of appellant, we will state the facts in the light most favorable to him. Johnny Wayne Seals was injured on May 10, 1966, when he was struck by an automobile driven by Smith in the course of his employment with St. Regis Paper Company. The accident happened at about 3:00 p. m. on U. S. Highway 98 about four miles east of Lucedale. Johnny was fourteen years of age at that time and a seventh grade student at Rocky Creek School in Lucedale. He was a passenger on a school bus and was returning home from school. His home was on the north side of the highway and when the bus reached a point opposite his home, it stopped to let him off. When the bus stopped, it had out the required stop sign and the required lights were blinking. A transport truck loaded with farm tractors was following the school bus and it stopped about thirty feet behind the bus. The transport truck was fifty-five feet long and the school bus was about forty-five feet long. At least one other car stopped behind the transport truck. The flag boy and Johnny got off the bus and the flag boy went to the center of the highway where he held out the flag. There was a car approaching from the east and the flag boy and Johnny were watching the car to see if it was going to stop. After the flag boy had held out the flag for about twenty-five or thirty seconds, Johnny started across the road and he was struck by the front of the automobile driven by Smith. The force of the blow knocked Johnny about twenty feet into the air and about thirty feet to the right of where he had been struck.
Smith's version of the accident was that he could not see the school bus because of the transport truck and when the truck stopped, he pulled into the north lane to pass him. He estimated his speed as from thirty to thirty-five miles per hour. He stated that he was passing the truck when he saw yellow and immediately applied his brakes and blew his horn; that just as the front part of his car got past the school bus Johnny ran into the right front fender of his car. He said that the flag boy tried to stop Johnny, but Johnny walked into the side of his car and it threw him back, but did not knock him into the air. He admitted that he paid a fine for passing the school bus, but explained that the reason he did so was that the justice of the peace told him that technically he was guilty of passing a school bus although he was attempting to stop.
As a result of the accident Johnny suffered lacertations of the scalp, a break in the front of his pelvis bone, multiple abrasions on his body, and a laceration of the right buttock. He was carried to the George County Hospital where he was treated by Dr. Dayton Whites. The x-rays showed a slight displacement at the fracture site of the pelvis bone and there was some separation. Dr. Whites testified that it was necessary to use a catheter on Johnny for approximately five days and that this was painful. Johnny remained in the hospital for twenty-two days and during this time he required medication for pain. After he was discharged from the hospital, Dr. Whites did not see him again until the day of the trial. At that time he examined him and found some tenderness in his back, atrophy of the right leg, and an abnormal gait which caused callouses on his feet. It was Dr. Whites' opinion that Johnny had recovered as much as he was going to recover and that because he was still having pain in the back that this would continue to cause him trouble in the future.
On July 26, 1968, Johnny was examined by Dr. E. J. Holder to Laurel an orthopedic surgeon for the purpose of evaluation. Dr. Holder testified that he had the benefit of the x-rays which were taken on the day of the accident and that these x-rays revealed a complete fracture. Johnny gave him a history of persistent pain in his low back region primarily on the left and of trouble with his feet. After examination Dr. Holder found healed fractures of the superior and inferior ramus of the left pubis with sacroiliac sprain on the left, congenital deformities of both big toes, abnormal gait with callouses on both toes. It was his opinion that as a result of the fracture stress had been applied to the sacroiliac joint causing it to give or stretch. It was further his opinion that this condition was consistent with low back pain and that the the opinion that due to the stress and strain injury was permanent. He was also of of the joint Johnny's gait had changed causing callouses on his feet, and that any undue stress on the joint would cause more pain and more disability. He said that he would not recommend Johnny participating in sports, such as football, basketball and baseball. On cross examination Dr. Holder stated in answer to a question in regard to future disability that:
Well, the main thing he will have is pain, he's not going to do any more damage, I'd say, unless he sustains another fall or injury such as he has had already, but the biggest difficulty he is going to have is pain and discomfort, and over a long period of time I think he will have more degenerative arthritic changes in the joint if he applies undue stress to it.
Johnny's mother testified that after Johnny returned home from the hospital that he was confined to home for a month or two. She said that before the accident Johnny's physical condition was good except that he had a broken arm at the time of the accident and that his arm was in a cast. She said the cast was put on his arm by a doctor in Mobile who removed it after Johnny was released from the hospital. She said after the accident she observed abnormalities in his gait and that he is now unable to participate in sports. She said Johnny had tried to work some but when he did it resulted in pain in his back.
Johnny testified that he did not recall what happened after he started across the road on the day in which he was injured. When he regained consciousness he was in the hospital and was in severe pain. He said while in the hospital he had to lie flat on his back and his back and hip hurt all the time. He described the catheter procedure as being very painful. He stated that since the accident when he tried to play basketabll or baseball and when it was necessary for him to run his back and hips hurt. He also said that he had tried to work during the summer loading hay and picking corn and that this work caused such pain in his back and hips that he had to quit work.
The proof on behalf of appellees and cross appe...
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