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Rush v. City of Maple Heights (Ohio, 1958)

Submitted by boden-davidson on Mon, 2010-01-25 16:26
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  1. Rush was injured in a fall from her motorcycle and brought suit for the damages to her motorcycle against the municipality for negligent maintenance of the streets and prevailed; then, Rush brought a suit for her personal injuries received in the same accident in the county court and got her motion for trial
  2. in bringing the second suit, Rush is trying to say that the decision in the first case should be carried over because it was decided that the city had been negligent. Because of the Ohio minority rules regarding evidentiary standards for causes of actions, Rush thinks that she can try the easy property damage case first, get the easy recovery, and then skip right to the damages determination in her more difficult personal injury action. [minority rule also known as "different evidence" rule]. High court here says that the point [paragraph four] in Vasu was only dictum, while Rush had proposed that paragraph four was the law in Ohio. Doesn't matter that she won on the first suit... She had the opportunity to have the personal injury cause of action to be heard
  3. background to the majority rule: an incident can give rise to many different causes of action, so as long as plaintiff had the opportunity to present all the causes coming out of the incident [same transaction, series of transactions], then res judicata if a a valid judgment is rendered in a previous action: -same parties and the same transactions.
  4. Rush's original theory rested on the differences of evidence for the personal injury and the property damages causes of action [minority]
  5. what if a third-party were involved? [a passenger in the car accident]: res judicata does not apply because not the same parties, but can consolidate [state] or joinder [federal]
  6. Rush - saying that cause of action in second suit is not subject to res judicata by the determination in the first suit because they were different causes of action, but that the determination of an issues in the first
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