CLEVELAND JOHNSON, APPELLANT,
v.
STEPHEN M. LASALLE AND REGAL INSURANCE COMPANY, A FOREIGN INSURER, APPELLEES
AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.
The court held that a defendant seeking a setoff for PIP payments must use an itemized verdict to ascertain economic damages, as a general verdict does not allow for such a determination.
Plaintiff was awarded $66,500 in an undifferentiated verdict after being found 90% comparatively negligent. Defendant sought a setoff for $10,000 in P…
The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.
Explore caselaw by topic → Browse Two Issue Rule cases and more on FLexlaw
FARMER, J.
In this case involving a motor vehicle striking a pedestrian, the parties agreed to a general verdict form in which all damages, both economic and noneconomic, were aggregated into a single sum. Plaintiff sought both economic and noneconomic damages from the jury. After an undifferentiated verdict of $66,500 in damages in which plaintiffs comparative negligence was set at 90%, defendant sought a setoff of $10,000 for economic damages, PIP payments, already made by the insurer. The trial court granted the motion. Just as we did in Odom v. Carney, 625 So. 2d 850 (Fla. 4th DCA 1993), and Barhoush v. Louis, 452 So. 2d 1075 (Fla. 4th DCA 1984), on similar facts as regards this procedural issue, we reverse the setoff and remand for judgment in the amount of $6,650.
The two-issue rule bars a party from contending that the undifferentiated award of total damages represents all or any part of plaintiffs economic damages. See Odom, 625 So. 2d at 851 (verdict fails to state how much of $20,000 is for medicals and how much is for earnings); Barhoush, 452 So. 2d at 1077 (general verdict of $1.8 trillion fails to state amount, if any, awarded for economic loss). In point of fact, the amount of the jury’s award here exceeds the economic damages sought by plaintiff, and is well below the total noneconomic damages she was seeking.
The general verdict in Odom prevented us from discerning how much the jury had actually awarded for different kinds of economic damages, only one kind of which would have required a PIP setoff. The present case presents the same kind of damages problem as Odom in the context of a PIP setoff. If a defendant desires to preserve the right to a PIP setoff, then an itemized verdict should be used to enable the actual economic damages to be ascertained without speculation. We therefore reach the same result as Odom and reverse the setoff.
GUNTHER and STONE, JJ., concur.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Cited By
-
Midtown Enters., Inc. v. Local Contractors, Inc., 785 So. 2d 578 (Fla. 3d DCA 2001)…ss $12,000 for delay damages suffered by Local Contractors, and therefore, the jury, did not award Local Contractors anything for correction and completion work. Without an itemized verdict, however, this is only conjecture.- See Johnson v. LaSalle, 774 So. 2d 760, 761 (Fla. 4th DCA 2000). For the foregoing reasons, we reverse and remand with instructions. . The trial court repeatedly expressed its disagreement with the verdict and its reluctance to interfere: ... The problem I have with your claim is, to…
-
Garcia v. Arraga, 872 So. 2d 266 (Fla. 4th DCA 2004)…amount awarded for economic damages versus non-economic damages. Under the two-issue rule, a party who cannot differentiate economic damages from the total award is barred from seeking a deduction of collateral source payments. Johnson v. La-Salle, 774 So. 2d 760 (Fla. 4th DCA 2000). We find this argument to be without merit. Economic damages are verifiable monetary losses which include medical expenses, loss of earnings, burial costs, property loss, and the like.8 The record discloses that the only damages…
Authorities Cited
- ALC Interior Sys. & Se. Fire Ins. Co. v. Hall, 452 So. 2d 1075 (Fla. 1st DCA 1984)
- Odom v. Carney, 625 So. 2d 850 (Fla. 4th DCA 1993)
- Ahmed H. Barhoush, M.D. v. Louis, 452 So. 2d 1075 (Fla. 4th DCA 1984)