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Choi v. Anvil9/7/2001
No. 5465
I. INTRODUCTION
Jun E. Choi rear-ended another car with his taxi cab. Plaintiffs injured in the collision sued Choi to recover their damages and prevailed following a jury trial. Choi appeals, contending that the plaintiffs' failure to present expert testimony on causation and damages required the trial court to enter a directed verdict in his favor. We affirm, concluding that the plaintiffs were not required to present expert testimony to establish their claims.
II. FACTS AND PROCEEDINGS
Jun Choi, a taxi cab driver for Quyana Cab in Bethel, was driving a cab with three passengers when he rear-ended a pick-up truck driven by Gloria Anvil. Anvil also had three passengers in her pick-up. The road was icy, and Choi was unable to stop.
No one sustained visible physical injuries in the collision or sought medical attention immediately afterward. Everyone except Choi and Anvil left the scene before Officer Jerry Evan arrived to investigate the accident. Although three of the plaintiffs consulted physicians or health aides about pain they experienced after the accident, apparently none of their injuries required any specific medical treatment between the time of the accident and the trial.
Choi's three passengers, Anvil, and two of her passengers filed suit for injuries allegedly suffered in the accident. In his answer, Choi admitted that he negligently caused the collision. Superior Court Judge Dale O. Curda conducted a two-day jury trial on the issues of causation and damages, with all evidence and witness testimony occurring the first day.
In their trial testimony, the plaintiffs complained of various ailments like back, neck, and arm pain. None of the plaintiffs provided any expert testimony or otherwise offered any evidence beyond their own testimony to establish the causation, permanence, or extent of their alleged injuries. Only four other witnesses testified at trial: Officer Evan; Choi, by videotaped deposition; Cezary Maczynski, a mechanic who testified that Choi did not ask him for an estimate on the damages to the cab; and Gemma Akerelrea, a community health practitioner in Scammon Bay who testified briefly by telephone that plaintiff Hazel Akerelrea, her sister-in-law, complained of pain after the accident.
At the close of Anvil's case, Choi moved for a directed verdict. The court initially denied the motion, but later granted it with respect to future damages. The jury returned substantial verdicts in favor of the plaintiffs. Choi appeals, raising a single issue --that the plaintiffs were required as a matter of law to present expert evidence to establish causation of their "subjective injuries."
III. DISCUSSION
Choi urges us to adopt a rule that would require expert testimony to establish causation of "subjective injuries" in personal injury actions. Citing several Nebraska Supreme Court cases, Choi argues that his proposed rule is justified because " ubjective injuries require a lay person to speculate as to the existence and cause of injury." We decline to adopt such a rule.
Our case law requires expert testimony only when the nature or character of a person's injuries require the special skill of an expert to help present the evidence to the trier of fact in a comprehensible format. In Houger v. Houger, we considered an argument that an expert was necessary to establish that an injured worker was medically unfit for work. We rejected that argument, noting that "there are numerous . . . matters involving health and bodily soundness, not exclusively within the domain of medical science, upon which the ordinary experience of everyday
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