Metropolitan Railway Company v Wright
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Date | 1885 |
| Year | 1885 |
| Court | House of Lords |
Practice - New Trial - Verdict against Evidence - Principle on which New Trial allowed.
A new trial ought not to be granted on the ground that the verdict of the jury was against the weight of the evidence, unless the verdict was one which a jury, viewing the whole of the evidence reasonably, could not properly find.
Observations by Lord Halsbury on Solomon v. Bitton (
APPEAL from a decision of the Court of Appeal.
The respondent, a passenger on the appellants' line, stepped out of a train at King's Cross Station, and was by the motion of the train thrown on to the platform, sustaining injuries in respect of which she brought this action. At the trial before Huddleston B. and a special jury in July 1884 the plaintiff's case was that the company's servants were guilty of negligence in not looking out and not answering her calls for assistance and in allowing the train to move on after she had begun to alight. The defendants' case was that there was no negligence on their part; that the train had begun to move before the plaintiff had begun to alight, and that the accident was caused or contributed to by her negligence. Upon these points there was conflicting evidence; the plaintiff being called on the one side, and several of the company's servants on the other.
The jury found a verdict for the plaintiff for £300. The Divisional Court (Lord Coleridge C.J. and Stephen J.) ordered a new trial on the ground that the verdict was against the weight of the evidence. The Court of Appeal (Earl of Selborne L.C. Brett M.R. and Lindley L.J.) on the 7th of March 1885 reversed this decision and ordered the verdict to stand. In the course of giving judgment the following observations were made:—
EARL OF SELBORNE L.C.:—
We all think that there are not sufficient grounds for a new trial in this case. As the verdict was not perverse or unreasonable, looking to the evidence given, it does not seem to us to be a case in which the decision of the jury, who are the proper judges of such questions, should be interfered with. The damages are, I think, plainly not excessive, if the verdict is right, or if the verdict was one which the jury, in the exercise of their proper judgment, were entitled to give. In many cases the principles on which new trials should be granted on the ground of difference of opinion which may exist as to the effect of the evidence have been considered, both in the House of Lords, and in the lower Courts, and I have...
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Mechanical and General Inventions Company and Lehwess v Austin and Austin Motor Company
...on the ground that the verdict was against the weight of evidence the Court of Appeal, applying the principle laid down in Metropolitan Railway Co. v. Wright, 11 A.C. 152, set aside the verdict, holding that it was utterly irreconcilable with the evidence in the case when reasonably conside......
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...aside that finding of the jury unless it was "perverse" in this sense, that it was a finding no reasonable man could reach, see Metropolitan Railway v. Wright (1886) 11 Appeal Cases 152: Mechanical and General Inventions Co. v. Austin Motor Co. (1935) Appeal Cases at pages 374—5 by Lord Wri......
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