Wash. Court of Appeals published opinion — 850661.pdf

Citation: Wash. Court of Appeals published opinion — 850661.pdf
Jurisdiction: Washington (state)
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Original Source: https://www.courts.wa.gov/opinions/pdf/850661.pdf ↗

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form, “[w]here there is no request by either party during the course of the trial to

segregate items in a verdict, the court is without a basis to thereafter dissect the

general verdict to determine what part represented what items.” Wheeler v.

Catholic Archdiocese of Seattle, 124 Wn.2d 634, 641-42, 880 P.2d 29 (1994).

Here, SPD failed to make two critical objections at trial to preserve this

argument for appeal. First, SPD failed to object to the following jury instruction

(instruction no. 30) regarding claims 2, 3 and 4:

If your verdict is for Sgt. Hockett for one, some or all of the
employment claims, you must determine the amount of money that
will reasonably and fairly compensate him for such damages as you
find were proximately caused by the acts of [SPD]. You should
consider the following elements:

....

(3) The emotional harm to Sgt. Hockett caused by [SPD’s]
wrongful conduct, including emotional distress, loss of
enjoyment of life, humiliation, pain and suffering, personal
indignity, embarrassment, fear, anxiety, and/or anguish
experienced and with reasonable probability to be
experienced by Sgt. Hockett in the future.

....

. . . The law has not furnished us with any fixed standards by which
to measure emotional distress[,] loss of enjoyment of life[,]
humiliation[,] pain and suffering[,] personal indignity,
embarrassment[,] fear, anxiety, and/or anguish. With reference to

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For the current opinion, go to https://www.lexisnexis.com/clients/wareports/.
No. 85066-1-I

these matters, you must be governed by your own judgment, by the
evidence in the case, and by these instructions.

This instruction tells the jury there are nine categories of “emotional harm”

damages, including but not limited to “emotional distress” damages, and that there