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Grant v. Kmart Corporation12/18/2001
1996, Plaintiff, Dorothy Grant, was lawfully on the Defendant's premises as a consumer for the purpose of purchasing goods and while he walked through the store, she suddenly and without warning came into contact with water on the floor of said store which caused Plaintiff, Dorothy Grant, to fall to the floor with great force and violence, thereby sustaining serious bodily injuries. Said accident and injuries to Plaintiff, Dorothy Grant, resulting therefrom were solely caused by the negligence of the Defendant.
. In its answer to the complaint, in number five of its second defense, KMart said, "This Defendant denies the allegations of paragraph 6 of the complaint." By this response, KMart denied that Grant fell in its store and suffered injuries.
. During discovery, KMart attempted to obtain, through interrogatories and Grant's deposition, information from Grant regarding any falls or accidents she had suffered prior and subsequently to the fall she had at KMart. The majority says that "the problem in Grant's answers relate to interrogatory number 12, not to number 13." Majority opinion at . I agree.
. In interrogatory number 12, Grant was asked if she had "ever suffered any injuries to shoulders, back, knees or hip in any accident either prior to or subsequent to the accident in the complaint." Grant, citing Scott v. Flynt, 704 So. 2d 998 (Miss. 1996), objected to answering this interrogatory on the basis that the requested information was beyond the scope of discovery and contrary to the holding in Scott. I have difficulty understanding counsel's reliance on Scott to support his position. Perhaps, he relied on the passage in Scott where the court stated, "It is understood that evidence does not have to be admissible to be discoverable, only relevant." Id. at 1004. Grant's counsel may have considered the requested information irrelevant since KMart had denied in its answer that Grant fell in its store. If KMart's only defense had been that the fall did not occur, counsel's position would have been a bit more understandable. However, when the totality of KMart's answers is considered, there is no doubt that KMart also alleged that Grant's injuries, if any, were caused by someone or some entity other than KMart. Therefore, the information was discoverable. In any event, once the trial court correctly ruled that Grant should provide the requested information, she was under an obligation to do so, notwithstanding her view on the appropriateness of the ruling.
. While Grant's supplemental responses are not included in the record, all parties agree that, after she had been ordered by the trial judge to give complete responses to KMart's interrogatories, she gave the following limited answer to interrogatory number twelve: "I was treated at the Mississippi Sports Medicine Clinic. I do not recall the name of the treating physician." The record does not reflect who prepared the responses. It is not unreasonable, however, to assume that probably they were prepared by counsel since Grant was represented by counsel. Surely, if counsel prepared the answers, he simply may have been careless and not thoroughly familiar with the medical information in his client's file. Grant may have signed them without first carefully scrutinizing what she was signing. If such were the case, that would not erase the fact that this answer was true but incomplete. The trial court had ordered that Grant give complete responses. When Grant gave only this answer, she clearly disobeyed the trial court's order, but the question remains as to whether she acted wilfully or in bad faith. We cannot, however, know the intricacies of how the incomplete answer came to be given. The record does not lead us
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