Wood v. Holah

• Decision Date: 17 December 1907
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: WOOD v. HOLAH.

68 A. 323

80 Conn. 314

WOOD

v. HOLAH.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

Dec. 17, 1907.

Appeal from Court of Common Pleas, Fairfield County; Howard B. Scott, Judge.

Petition of Edmund C. Wood against William E. Holah for new trial. Petition denied on facts found, and petitioner appeals. Affirmed.

The case for which a new trial was sought was that of Wood v. Holah, 79 Conn. 215, 64 Atl. 220. Judgment for the defendant was rendered therein. The plaintiff thereafter brought the present petition, alleging as the sole reason why a new trial should be granted improper conduct on the part of the acting judge who tried the cause, which was prejudicial to the plaintiff. The court below found the facts to be that after the conclusion of the trial, and before the rendition of judgment, one of the witnesses for the plaintiff had a conversation with the judge concerning the case, which conversation is detailed in the finding, as are also the circumstances under which it was had. It was found that the witness' action was without solicitation or knowledge of either party, with no knowledge on the witness' part of its impropriety, and in spite of the judge's endeavors to show to the witness by his manner that he wished the conversation closed. It was also found that the conversation did not affect the decision of the case.

Frederick W. Holden and Walter A. Holden, for appellant George E. Hill, for appellee.

PRENTICE, J. (after stating the facts as above). A petition for a new trial is addressed to the discretion of the court, and will never be granted except upon substantial grounds. It will not be granted where the error or irregularity is a harmless one. Lester v. State, 11 Conn. 415, 418; State v. Brockhaus, 72 Conn. 109, 116, 43 Atl. 850. The action of the court thereon being discretionary, it will not ordinarily be reviewed. As, however, the discretion which the court is called upon to exercise is not an absolute, but a legal, one, this court will upon appeal set aside its action when it appears that there was a misconception on its part as to the limits of its power, that there was error in the proceedings preliminary to the exercise of its discretion, or that there was a clear abuse in its exercise of that discretion. Carrington v. Holabird, 17 Conn. 530, 539; Gannon v. State, 75 Conn. 576, 578, 54 Atl. 199; Selleck v. Heard, 77 Conn. 15, 58 Atl. 224. In the present case there is no claim that the court misconceived the limits of its powers, or that error entered into the proceedings upon the petition preparatory to the court's final action. If the denial of the prayer of the petition is to be set aside, it must be for the reason that such denial was an abuse of the judicial discretion upon the facts found as to the irregular conduct of the trial judge. The court below found that this conduct, improper though it was, did not influence the decision of the case. This finding of the harmless character of the misconduct, if it is to stand, justifies the denial of the petition upon the recognized principle already stated.

But it is urged that it was not competent for the court below to reach that conclusion. It is said that the law limits the powers of a trial judge in passing upon a question of this character to a finding that the judge guilty of impropriety was unconscious of prejudice, and that the law for reasons of public policy attaches to misconduct of the kind in question the ineffaceable...