HARRISBURG, Pa. (Legal Newsline) – On Aug. 13, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania decided that although a trial court erred in permitting a testimony, the error was “harmless” because the testimony did not prejudice the appellant.
The testimony in question was given by Amber Boyer after a February 2013 accident during a winter storm that resulted in the death of Desiree Smith, a passenger in a car driven by Diedre Steiner.
“The jury was instructed to consider the issue of Steiner’s negligence only if it found Jim’s (Custom Collision) negligent,” the court wrote. “Since the jury found Jim’s was not negligent, the jury did not consider Steiner’s negligence during deliberations. As such, the trial court’s error did not prejudice appellant and the error was harmless.”
Appellant Vicky Kurtz, who filed individually and as the estate administrator of the Smith, sued Jim’s Custom Collision Inc. and others. Kurtz alleged that the accident was caused by an improper tire rotation performed on Steiner’s car.
A jury in the Jefferson County Court of Common Pleas found in favor of Jim’s Custom Collision on April 13, 2017, and determined that the business was not “negligent in failing to properly inspect and rotate the tires on Steiner’s vehicle,” the ruling states.
Boyer, who was traveling in the opposite direction of the crash, testified that she saw Steiner’s car, “which was traveling between 50 and 60 miles per hour, sliding into her lane for approximately 2 seconds,” the ruling states.
The Superior Court found that although the trial court had previously found that Boyer had the necessary amount of time to “make a reasonable estimation of the vehicle’s speed,” her testimony stating that her “visibility was impaired due to the weather conditions at the time of the accident,” was a factor in weighing against permitting the testimony.
The Superior Court stated in the seven-page filing that the purpose of Boyer’s testimony was to establish Steiner’s contributory negligence and to establish that Steiner was driving too fast for the winter conditions. Kurtz’s argument that even though Boyd’s testimony “only went to contributory negligence,” that it was still “prejudicial with respect to the jury’s negligence finding,” the court stated.
The court said that Kurtz’s argument was without merit.
Superior Court of Pennsylvania case number 713 WDA 2017