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Graber v. City Of Ankeny9/7/2000
by the plaintiff prior to trial. 481 N.W.2d at 339. This case does not provide authority for the admission of settlement evidence here, however, because in Garren the plaintiff objected to any instruction allowing the jury to allocate fault to the released parties. Id. at 337, 339. Therefore, the challenged evidence in Garren was relevant to a disputed issue, which is not the situation here. Therefore, Garren is not helpful in analyzing the issue before us in this case.
We think that to allow settlement evidence to be admitted under the circumstances present here—where the witness's status as a released party is not at issue—would result in the automatic admission of such settlements in every case where the plaintiff settles with less than all the defendants. Such a result would seriously undermine Iowa's public policy to encourage settlements. We hold, therefore, that the trial court abused its discretion in admitting the evidence in this case.
3. Prejudice.
As noted above, prejudice is presumed when evidence is erroneously admitted, "unless the contrary is affirmatively established." Lewis, 278 N.W.2d at 15. The record before us does not show a lack of prejudice so as to overcome this presumption. Clearly, evidence of the plaintiff's settlement with Allen would tend to imply to the jury that the plaintiff had already received a measure of compensation for her injury and that Allen would not have paid money to settle the case if Allen did not think she was at fault. These misleading implications deprived the plaintiff of a substantial right to have the issues in the case determined on the merits of the relevant evidence. Therefore, we hold that the plaintiff is entitled to a new trial untainted by evidence of her settlement with Allen. Although our decision on this issue requires reversal, we will address other issues raised on appeal that will arise again upon retrial.
III. Did the District Court Err in Instructing the Jury on the Issues of (1) Legal Excuse, (2) Res Ipsa Loquitur, (3) Plaintiff's Fault, (4) the Definition of Red Light, and (5) Speed?
We review the trial court's instructions to the jury for correction of errors of law. See Iowa Mut. Ins. Co. v. McCarthy, 572 N.W.2d 537, 545 (Iowa 1997). In addition to the principle that "the theories of both parties must be submitted to the jury when supported by substantial evidence," Lockard v. Carson, 287 N.W.2d 871, 875 (Iowa 1980), the following principles regarding jury instructions are also well established:
A material misstatement of the law warrants reversal. It is also reversible error to submit an instruction having no support in the record. "When considering whether evidentiary support for an instruction exists, [the court] give the evidence the most favorable construction it will bear." . . . eversal is required when instructions are conflicting and confusing. An instruction is not confusing if, when the instructions are considered as a whole, one must conclude "that the jury could not have misapprehended the issue presented by the challenged instruction." Waits, 572 N.W.2d at 575 (citations omitted).
"A party is not entitled to any particular form of instruction, but merely to instructions which fairly state the law as applied to the facts." Rumley v. City of Mason City, 320 N.W.2d 648, 652 (Iowa App. 1982).
A. Legal excuse.
Under the legal excuse doctrine, a jury may excuse a party's failure to comply with a statute if the party was confronted with an emergency not of the party's own making. See Weiss v. Bal, 501 N.W.2d 478, 480 (Iowa 1993). Here, the plaintiff requested an instruction that Allen claimed that if the jury found th
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