HARRISBURG – The Superior Court of Pennsylvania is deciding whether to uphold a Philadelphia County trial court’s decision to deny a post-verdict motion to vacate and order a new trial, in the case of a woman who sued a Colombian restaurant in Philadelphia even though she first told hospital staff she wasn't injured there.
In an October 2018 lawsuit filed in the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas, appellant Dulce Huertas claims severe injuries she sustained two years prior, on Oct. 23, 2016, were the result of being violently attacked by a complete stranger while a patron at an establishment called El Bochinche Restaurante, located in Philadelphia and owned-operated by appellee Ruthmira Giraldo.
However, Giraldo asserts that evidence introduced at the trial shows that the assault in question did not happen inside El Bochinche – and that Huertas was both committing fraud by bringing suit in the first place and was the only witness who testified that an unknown man, Jose Mina, assaulted her while she attended a party at El Bochinche.
Huertas, meanwhile, maintains that she was standing in a hallway at El Bochinche, assisting another woman who may have been assaulted on the premises when she herself was randomly assaulted by Jose Mina, an intoxicated patron at the restaurant, who was a stranger to herself, but a close friend of Giraldo.
A Philadelphia jury ultimately concluded in January 2022 that Huertas had not been on the property when the assault occurred, and on appeal to the Superior Court, counsel for Huertas counters that such a conclusion was reached only because it was improperly limited in the nature and scope of evidence it could provide at trial – and that were it not for those rulings, the final trial result may have been different.
On Oct. 3, the appellant filed a brief to that effect with the Superior Court.
“In this case, the trial court made several serious erroneous evidentiary rulings at the trial of this matter, which not only ‘may have affected’ the verdict but in fact quite likely changed the result. Accordingly, plaintiff moved under Pennsylvania Rule of Civil Procedure 227.1 for the Court to vacate the verdict and order a new trial. Plaintiff’s motion was not granted by the trial court, but this Court should reverse. In a premises liability action – such as this case – it is axiomatic that no fact in dispute can possibly be more significant than whether the plaintiff was actually on the premises controlled by the defendants when she sustained injury, therefore any erroneous evidentiary rulings pertinent to that issue cannot possibly be considered ‘harmless,” according to the appellant’s brief.
“As plaintiff warned repeatedly at the trial of this matter, the defendants were able to push this false ‘fraud’ narrative as the direct result of the trial court’s erroneous evidentiary rulings. In particular, plaintiff identified three specific erroneous evidentiary rulings made by the trial court in her post-trial motion, which she continues to raise presently; each of these erroneous evidentiary rulings significantly and unfairly assisted the defendants in pushing the false ‘fraud’ narrative.”
The brief added that, in the appellant’s view, the trial court made a number of errors, including:
• Improperly permitting the defendants to enter into evidence and publish to the jury a narrative statement from plaintiff’s Nazareth Hospital medical records, despite the same being unreliable hearsay, over the plaintiff's strenuous objection;
• Allowing the Nazareth Statement into evidence was compounded exponentially when the trial court improperly tied the hands of Huertas by forbidding her from bringing out a narrative statement from her Temple Hospital medical records that would have completely contradicted the defendants’ false ‘fraud’ narrative;
• Failing to timely rule on the plaintiff’s motion in limine to preclude evidence of other incidents or take any remedial action, and in so doing, the Court further prejudiced the plaintiff by permitting the Defendants to repeatedly call plaintiff a liar during their opening statement with reference to ‘other incidents’ that the Court later acknowledged were not relevant to this case and which were not allowed to be brought into evidence.
“Although the trial court ultimately did agree that all of these ‘other incidents’ were inadmissible and, very late in the trial, plaintiff’s motion in limine was eventually granted, the prejudice to plaintiff was already very serious: The defendants were able to bring out all of these ‘other incidents’ in a very defamatory manner, where the only thing the jury heard was the defendants’ wild allegations without plaintiff having a chance to correct the misperceptions created by the defendants as to plaintiff’s credibility,” the brief states.
On Oct. 31, counsel for Giraldo and her restaurant filed their own brief to the Superior Court, wanting it to uphold the denial of the motion to vacate and for a new trial, previously issued by the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas.
“On Oct. 23, 2016, Ruthmira Giraldo, owner of El Bochinche Restaurant, hosted its annual celebratory party commemorating the 15th anniversary of its establishment. Ruthmira learned to cook in her home country of Colombia. When she immigrated to America, she opened El Bochinche Restaurante in 2002. El Bochinche Restaurante is a family restaurant where patrons can enjoy authentic Colombian food. The restaurant is small, and its layout consists of a narrow entryway that stretches past a bar and seating towards the restrooms located at the rear. The layout at El Bochinche Restaurante allows someone standing at the front to see into the rear of the building where the restrooms are located,” the appellee’s brief said.
“On the night of this alleged incident, there were about 45 to 50 people at El Bochinche Restaurante attending the party. Larry Tucker, the security guard, checked patron’s I.D. upon entrance and monitored the ongoing festivities. At about 10:30 p.m., Jose Mina entered El Bochinche Restaurante, accompanied by three women and a man. One of these women was the appellant, Dulce Huertas. At midnight, an altercation occurred when two of these women began yelling at each other in the back of the restaurant. Jose Mina was attempting to separate the women, when Mr. Tucker intervened and escorted the women from the premises. Both appellee Giraldo and security guard Tucker identified the appellant Huertas as one of the women involved in the dispute.”
Tucker testified that “neither of the women involved in the altercation were injured, and explained that neither of the women had any bruising or bleeding, nor had they stated that they were injured.” Additionally, Huertas allegedly did not tell Tucker that a man had assaulted her or that her eye was injured.
Rather, Tucker said he escorted the uninjured Huertas out of the bar and onto the street, where she then disbursed and never returned to the restaurant. Tucker testified that there were no other altercations at El Bochinche Restaurante that night, and Jose Mina did not assault Huertas at El Bochinche Restaurant.”
The appellees’ brief continues that Giraldo also testified that Huertas was involved in the dispute with the other woman, and recalls that the two women who were with Jose Mina began yelling at each other and pulling each other’s hair.
Almost immediately, according to the brief, Giraldo observed Tucker separate the two women and escort them out of El Bochinche Restaurante. Giraldo further testified that there were no other altercations at El Bochinche Restaurante that night, and Jose Mina did not assault Huertas there.
“Two other witnesses who were also present at El Bochinche Restaurante testified during the trial. Both Mary Quinceo and Carmen Hernandez Reynoso unequivocally denied that Jose Mina assaulted the appellant at El Bochinche Restaurante. After this alleged assault, the appellant sought medical treatment at Nazareth Hospital at about 5:30 a.m., the morning of October 23. While at the hospital, appellant reported to her physician that she was punched in the eye while walking down the street,” the brief stated.
Counsel for Giraldo argued that Huertas had a history of being previously assaulted on multiple occasions – with one having allegedly taken place just six months prior to the events at issue – and had sought medical attention for these assaults, making these statements to the jury.
Though, the appellees’ counsel was later prevented from referring to these prior incidents through a motion in limine approved late in the trial, and the jury was instructed to disregard all mentions of said incidents.
Oral arguments took place before the Superior Court earlier this week, where the action remains pending.
Superior Court of Pennsylvania case 248 EDA 2022
Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas case 181002851
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com