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Tuck v. Warren Consolidated. Schools9/28/2001
UNPUBLISHED
Defendant appeals by right from a jury-trial-based judgment awarding plaintiff three million dollars in this automobile negligence action. We affirm.
This case arose from a bus accident in September 1993. During trial, plaintiff, who is confined to a wheelchair, alleged that defendant negligently failed to install locking devices to secure her wheelchair while she was a passenger on defendant's bus. Plaintiff theorized that her injuries, a closed head injury and resulting seizure condition, were caused when she violently struck her head after her wheelchair became loose during a bus ride. Defendant maintained that any injuries sustained during the bus accident were minor and that plaintiff's seizure condition was caused by cerebral palsy, which she has had since birth, or a brain injury sustained during a 1989 surgery.
On appeal, defendant first argues that the trial court erred in precluding admission of plaintiff's 1991 medical malpractice complaint, related to the 1989 surgery, in which plaintiff alleged a seizure condition as one of her injuries. We review a trial court's decision to exclude evidence for an abuse of discretion. Zeeland Farm Services, Inc v JBL Enterprises, Inc, 219 Mich App 190, 200; 555 NW2d 733 (1996). An abuse of discretion exists if an unprejudiced person would find no justification for the ruling made. People v Rice (On Remand), 235 Mich App 429, 439; 597 NW2d 843 (1999). Moreover, an evidentiary error is not a basis for reversal unless "it is more probable than not that the error was outcome determinative." People v Lukity, 460 Mich 484, 495-496; 596 NW2d 607 (1999). See also MCR 2.613(A) (" n error in the admission or the exclusion of evidence . . . is not ground . . . for setting aside a verdict . . . unless refusal to take this action appears to the court inconsistent with substantial justice").
We cannot say that the trial court abused its discretion in precluding admission of the complaint. Indeed, although the complaint was relevant to issues raised at trial, it bore a substantial risk of unfair prejudice. See MRE 403. As noted in Zeeland Farm Services, supra at 201, a risk of unfair prejudice can arise from the danger that marginally probative evidence will be given undue or preemptive weight by the jury such that an inequity would result if the proponent were allowed to use the evidence. The 1991 complaint did not indicate that plaintiff suffered from grand mal seizures, as argued at trial in the instant case. Rather, "a seizure condition" was one of numerous ailments listed in the 1991 complaint. Under MCR 2.111, a party may "allege two or more statements of fact in the alternative when in doubt about which of the statements is true" and may "state as many separate claims" as she has. MCR 2.111(A)(2). Given the requirements of MCR 2.111, we conclude that there was a legitimate risk that the jury might be unduly influenced by plaintiff's 1991 complaint.
Moreover, as discussed infra, defendant had, and was allowed to use, less prejudicial means of supporting its position that plaintiff previously suffered from a seizure condition. See Zeeland Farm Services, supra at 201. Accordingly, no abuse of discretion occurred.
Even if the trial court had abused its discretion in precluding the evidence, the error was harmless, because defendant amply advanced its position through other evidence. Defendant admitted, without objection, plaintiff's medical records, which indicated that she may have had a seizure condition or seizure-related characteristics after the 1989 surgery. Further, defendant's experts, one of whom treated plaintiff after the 1989 surgery, testified that plaintiff had a seizure condi
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