Robert M. Roberts v. Benjamin and Kallie Roberts

Summary

The Wyoming Supreme Court affirmed a jury verdict finding Benjamin and Kallie Roberts not negligent after Robert M. Roberts fell from their porch and was injured. The court held that testimony concerning whether a hypothetical hole should have been filled was properly excluded as unhelpful standard-of-care testimony, and that evidence of Roberts’s alcohol consumption was properly admitted as relevant to competing causation theories.

Holdings

1. A party-opponent admission under W.R.E. 801(d)(2) is not automatically admissible and remains subject to scrutiny under other applicable rules of evidence. The district court properly excluded the defendants' testimony that a hypothetical hole should have been discovered and filled because it constituted unhelpful testimony concerning the standard of care.
2. The district court did not abuse its discretion by admitting evidence concerning Roberts's alcohol consumption on the day of the accident while excluding opinions that he was legally intoxicated. The consumption evidence was relevant to whether he stumbled from the deck or stepped into a hole, and its probative value was not substantially outweighed by unfair prejudice.

Questions Presented

1. Whether the district court abused its discretion by excluding the defendants' testimony concerning whether a hypothetical hole should have been filled.
2. Whether the district court abused its discretion by admitting evidence of Roberts's alcohol consumption on the day of the accident.

Disposition

affirmed