COLUMBUS, Ohio (Legal Newsline) – A regretful juror who decided late one Friday that she was done with jury duty complicated a defense verdict in a medical malpractice trial but not enough to order a new one, the Ohio Supreme Court has ruled.
A recent opinion written by Justice Pat DeWine detailed the frustration of an eight-person jury that asked for a trial judge to accept their 4-4 deadlock on a Friday night rather than return for more deliberations on Monday.
Two jurors were so tired of the exercise that they switched sides. A month later, one of them wrote a letter to the court to convey her shame for doing so, but it was ruled inadmissible when the losing side moved for a new trial.
“Having excluded the juror’s letter, we are left with the mere fact that the jury broke a deadlock and returned a verdict soon after it was told to come back on Monday. There is no evidence that the jurors breached their oaths,” DeWine wrote.
“There is no evidence of any improper outside influence. And nothing in the jury’s notes to the judge suggests any misconduct.”
The Cleveland Clinic and other health care providers were sued by the Estate of ReDon Jones, who complained of chest pains and performed a stress test. His cardiologist interpreted the results as negative for ischemia, but Jones had a fatal heart attack a week later.
The subsequent lawsuit went to trial on a Monday, and the trial judge told the jury he promised to get them in the deliberations room by Friday.
Deliberations started at 11 a.m. on that Friday. Six hours later, the jury submitted a note to the judge that said “We are still undecided 4-4. What should we do?” The judge ordered them to “Keep deliberating.”
One juror had to be excused after that for a family emergency and jurors were given the option of resuming on Monday or starting over with an alternate juror. The jury chose the alternate juror, and deliberations restarted at 7:20.
Another note later that night said they were still deadlocked and asked “How long do we have to stay here tonight? Can we go home? We are tired, cranky, and see no changes in our opinions, based on the evidence in the foreseeable.”
The jurors told them they could leave and come back Monday. They responded, “Come back for what? We’re not going to change.”
At this point, the judge began to consider reading instructions relating to deadlocked deliberations, known as the Howard charge. At 10 p.m., while the judge and lawyers were discussing when to read it, the jury announced it had a verdict.
The lawyer for Jones’ estate said the verdict shouldn’t be accepted because of the circumstances. The judge, though, accepted the 6-2 defense verdict.
One of the jurors wrote the court a letter a month after the trial while the motion for a new one was pending. It said she “felt very strongly that the plaintiff was correct in the case and the defendant was negligent. Yet in the end, to speed the process along, I and one other juror changed our votes as the hour approached 11 p.m. Now I have to live with that decision which went against what I believed was right.”
An appeals court ruled that the judge abused his discretion by not ordering a new trial, but the Supreme Court found its reasoning lacking. It ordered the appeals court to consider other assignments of error, like whether the judge should have allowed a portion of the deposition of a Cleveland Clinic cardiac sonographer.
Justice Melody Stewart concurred with the majority but wrote the judge put the jury in a tough spot.
“It is no surprise that under circumstances like this, jurors might put their own personal interests above the interests of the parties,” she wrote.