Jacobs v. Goodspeed

This case focuses on the tension between a litigant’s constitutional right to have issues of fact determined by a jury and the trial court’s legal discretion to overturn a verdict in order to prevent a manifest injustice. On the facts of this case we come down on the side of the jury’s verdict and therefore reverse the trial court’s setting aside of the jury verdict for the defendants.

The plaintiff correctly observes that the issue directly before us is the action of the trial court in setting aside the verdict rather than that of the jury in rendering it. Lee v. Lee, 171 Conn. 1, 2, 368 A.2d…