Southern Poultry Co. v. Fletcher

Southern Poultry Company, Inc. v. Fletcher

Southern Poultry Co. v. Fletcher, 147 S.E.2d 870 (Ga. Ct. App. 1966)

Court: Court of Appeals of Georgia · State Appellate Courts
Decided: March 10, 1966
Docket: No. 41724
Judges: Felton, Frankum, Pannell
Citations: 147 S.E.2d 870113 Ga. App. 3741966 Ga. App. LEXIS 1070

Cited by 4

Opinion — Felton

Felton, Chief Judge.

Appellant has waived all grounds of his appeal except that the statement of the attorney relative to insurance required the grant of a new trial and that no proper reprimand and instructions would remove the effect of the reference to insurance. The jury was qualified as to one insurance company. There was no cross action by the defendant. In the absence of some special circumstances showing the interest of one insurance company in the plaintiff’s recovery it will be assumed that the court and jury understood that the defendant held a policy of insurance issued by the company with reference to which the jury was qualified. The trial judge was of the opinion that the reference to insurance by the attorney for the plaintiff was incidental. We concur in that view. What was foremost in the attorney’s mind was that a lawyer who was also an insurance investigator should see to it that witnesses who knew facts which tended to disprove contentions by the other party to a case should see that they are present to testify. Whether a lawyer is an insurance investigator or not he should know he should present the best case he can to a jury. The court’s statement to the jury was sufficient to remove from the case the fact that the defendant’s lawyer was an insurance investigator. There simply was no evidence of it. Whether it hurt the defendant is extremely doubtful. The facts of this case put it in the class of cases exemplified by Steinmetz v. Chambley, 90 Ga. App. 519 (5) ( 83 SE2d 318 ), and Bramlett v. Hulsey, 98 Ga. App. 39, 42 ( 104 SE2d 614 ). See also Houston v. Taylor, 50 Ga. App. 811, 814 ( 179 SE 207 ). If the attorney in this case had emphasized the fact that the defendant was insured, by insidious intention and design, we would have -a different case. The question of the grant of a mistrial is largely in the discretion of the trial judge and in this case we do not think that he abused the discretion by denying the motion for a mistrial.

*377 The court did not err in overruling the motions for a mistrial.

Judgment affirmed.

Frankum and Pannell, JJ., concur.

How later courts describe this case

No later court has written an explanatory parenthetical about this case yet.

Cited by 4 cases

View all citing references →

State Appellate Courts4

Relies on it most ⓘ

Doe v. Moss172 S.E.2d 321 (Ga. Ct. App. 1969)
City of MacOn v. Smith160 S.E.2d 622 (Ga. Ct. App. 1968)
Wallace v. Cates170 S.E.2d 40 (Ga. Ct. App. 1969)
State Highway Department v. Knox149 S.E.2d 188 (Ga. Ct. App. 1966)

Most recent

Doe v. Moss172 S.E.2d 321 (Ga. Ct. App. 1969)
Wallace v. Cates170 S.E.2d 40 (Ga. Ct. App. 1969)
City of MacOn v. Smith160 S.E.2d 622 (Ga. Ct. App. 1968)
State Highway Department v. Knox149 S.E.2d 188 (Ga. Ct. App. 1966)

Citing references are not a citator: they show that a later opinion cites this case, not whether it followed, distinguished, or overruled it. Check negative history before relying on this case.

Authorities cited 3

Depth	Case	Cited by
	Steinmetz v. Chambley, 83 S.E.2d 318 (Ga. Ct. App. 1954)	13
	Bramlett v. Hulsey, 104 S.E.2d 614 (Ga. Ct. App. 1958)	9
	Houston v. Taylor, 179 S.E. 207 (Ga. Ct. App. 1935)	7

`/`	Focus the search box
`j` `k`	Next / previous result
`Enter`	Open the selected result
`x`	Add / remove the selected result from the download list
`n` `p`	Next / previous search term in a case
`c`	Copy the citation of the current case
`+` `−`	Larger / smaller reading text
`?`	Show this list