Ford Motor Credit Company v. Hitchcock., 116 Ga. App. 563, 158 S.E.2d 468 (1967)
Linked as:
Summary
Judgment affirmed. Bell, P. J., concurs. Whitman, J., concurs specially.
Summary
Judgment affirmed. Bell, P. J., concurs. Whitman, J., concurs specially.
Text
Grady E. Rozar, for appellee.Morton P. Levine, H. A. Stephens, Jr., for appellant.
1. The "bad faith" which will authorize recovery of attorney's fees in an action seeking damages and attorney's fees under Code 20-1404 is "bad faith" in the transaction out of which the cause of action arose. Traders Ins. Co. v. Mann,
2. Enumeration of error 3 (d) complains that by giving in charge at three different places in the instructions that portion of Code 105-2002 which provides the jury may award additional damages ". . . as compensation for the wounded feelings of the plaintiff," the court gave undue emphasis to such contention as to this element of damages. One of the references is to a paragraph in the charge of respect of giving additional damages "either to deter the wrongdoer from repeating the trespass or as compensation for the wounded feelings of the plaintiff," and the other reference is to a paragraph later given in the charge wherein in immediate sequence the same language was twice used. It does not appear likely that the jury was in any way misled or influenced by the alleged repetition and harmful error does not appear therefrom. Grasham v. Southern R. Co.,
3. Enumeration 4 contends that the court erred in overruling appellant's motion for new trial as amended. Counsel for appellant in their brief in discussing the fourth enumeration in relation to the general grounds of the motion for new trial contend that by deducting from the valuation fixed by the appellee of her automobile repossessed by appellant, the net amount of the unpaid balance of purchase money thereon gives a net figure of only $719.01, as representing the interest of the appellee on April 13, 1966, the date of its repossession, and that when compared to the verdict in her favor in the amount of $3,500, the verdict is illegal and should be set aside.
In the case sub judice the evidence justified an award of punitive or exemplary damages. "In determining punitive or exemplary damages it is impossible to lay down any fixed rules for a precise mathematical calculation; 'and in every such case the amount of the finding must be largely in the power of the jury, who have no other guide but their enlightened consciences.'" City Motor Exchange v. Ballinger,
Neither in the original motion for new trial nor in the amendment thereto is there any express or special ground that the amount of the verdict was excessive. Such a contention cannot be urged under the general grounds of a motion for new trial. McFarland v. Bradley,
The verdict, therefore, is not erroneous on the ground of excessiveness and should not be set aside on that ground.
1967
Sponsored links
