Scott v. Times-Mirror Co.

California Supreme Court Aug 6, 1918 No. L. A. No. 4554. Department One.Published

Before: Richards

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Holding. The court affirmed the order granting a new trial because the trial court did not abuse its discretion in finding the damages excessive, though it clarified that the plaintiff was correctly permitted to introduce evidence of his professional reputation.

Issues

Whether the trial court abused its discretion in granting a new trial based on excessive damages.
Whether a plaintiff in a libel action involving professional reputation must affirmatively prove their professional standing when it is put in issue by the pleadings.

Disposition. affirmed

Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion

“It is an equally well-settled and long-established rule of this court that an order granting a new trial will not be disturbed upon appeal except upon a showing of clear and manifest abuse of discretion”

“The order of the trial court must, therefore, be affirmed upon these grounds, irrespective of whether the appellant is right or wrong as to certain other contentions.”

“A material issue was thus presented, upon which the plaintiff had the affirmative and was bound to offer evidence.”

Synopsis

Appeal—Order Granting New Trial—General Terms.—When the order of the trial court in granting a new trial is general in its terms, it will be affirmed if it could properly have been granted upon any of the grounds upon which the motion for it was predicated.

Id.—Reversal op Order—Rule.—An order granting a new trial will not be disturbed upon appeal except' upon a showing of clear and manifest abuse of discretion on the part of the trial court in respect to granting the same.

Action por Libel—Order Granting New Trial—Excessive Damages— Discretion not Abused.—In this action by an attorney at law for damages for libel wherein the verdict awarded him compensatory damages of ten thousand dollars and exemplary damages of twenty thousand dollars, it is held that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in granting a new trial upon either the ground of excessive compensatory or exemplary damages.

Id.—Injury to Reputation as Attorney at Law—Evidence—Good Reputation.—In an action by an attorney at law for libel of that form which tends to injure him in his reputation, evidence as to the good reputation of the plaintiff as an attorney at law is admissible, since the rule that every party to an action comes into court with the presumption of a good reputation as an individual, upon which presumption he is entitled to rely until his reputation as such has been assailed, is inapplicable with respect to the reputation of a litigant in his business or professional capacity.

Id.—Pleading—Professional Reputation.—In such an action, it is necessary for the plaintiff to allege in his complaint his good professional reputation, and the denial thereof raises a material issue, upon which the plaintiff is required t'o offer evidence.

[689]

RICHARDS, J., pro tem.

his is an appeal from an order granting the defendant’s motion for a new trial in an action for libel wherein the plaintiff was awarded compensatory damages in the sum of ten thousand dollars and exemplary damages in the sum of twenty thousand dollars by the verdict of a jury. A motion for a new trial having been made upon all the statutory grounds, the same was granted by a general order of the trial court. The main contention urged by the appellant as one of the grounds for the reversal of that order is that the trial court abused its discretion in attempting to set aside the verdict of the jury as to both of these elements and amounts of damage. A brief consideration of the nature of the action is essential to a determination of this as well as of the other points in the ease. The plaintiff in his complaint alleged that he was at the date of filing the same, and for some twenty years or more prior thereto had been, an attorney at law of the several courts of record of the state of California, practicing his profession-principally in Los Angeles, but also in several other counties of the said state and also in the state of Arizona, and that as such attorney at law he had always conducted and demeaned himself with honesty and fidelity and without any misconduct or malpractice in his said profession, and had thereby come to enjoy, and did enjoy, a good name and reputation as an attorney at law. He then proceeded to allege the facts and details of the publication complained of, which consisted of an article on a report regarding a certain action for divorce in which the plaintiff hereifi appeared as attorney of record for the plaintiff therein, with certain insinuations and animadversions reflecting upon the conduct of this plaintiff in the matter of advising and commencing said action, all of which this plaintiff alleged to be maliciously and knowingly false and to have been published with express malice and ill-will on the part of the defendant toward this plaintiff, and with the intent to injure him in his professional standing and reputation and to bring him into public discredit as an attorney at law, by reason whereof he had suffered ten thousand dollars actual and fifty thousand dollars exemplary damages. The answer of the defendant admitted the publication of the article complained of, but denied that it was either false or malicious.

[690]

Scott v. Times-Mirror Co.

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