Johnson v. Danny's Auto Body, Inc.

Dissenting Opinion

This case presents the question of whether a defendant which, after losing a civil case, undertakes in timely fashion and in good faith to seek a jury trial, may lose its constitutional right to do so because of conduct of others over which it had no control. This is not the garden variety of controversy where a party for one reason or another is tardy in completing some procedural step deemed essential to carrying on *86the litigation. With all deference, I suggest the underlying1 chronological facts warranted the trial judge in overruling the clerk’s rejection of…