S. Ct. Civ. No. 2012-0092

A Superior Court judgment entered on a jury verdict awarding damages to an employee of a large discount department store for a slip-and-fall incident occurring in the store is affirmed. Although the Superior Court abused its discretion in admitting a misdemeanor conviction for possession of stolen property for purposes of impeaching a defense witness where there was no indication that the conviction involved dishonesty or false statement as required under Federal Rule of Evidence 609(a), that error was harmless in light of another, more serious criminal conviction - a felony - used to impeach the same witness. Testimony in this case regarding plaintiff's future medical expenses was not too speculative to support the jury's award and it was not an abuse of discretion to admit this testimony. Even though the jury should not have been instructed to reduce any future damages award to present value - since this issue must be treated like an affirmative defense and defendant did not request this instruction or introduce evidence to support it - remanding for a new trial on future medical expenses without consideration of present value would provide greater (and unrequested) relief to plaintiff, who not only failed to file a cross-appeal, but also expressly does not request such relief. Accordingly, the Superior Court's August 13, 2012 judgment is affirmed.