Superior Insurance Co. v. Sanchez ( 1968 )

ON REHEARING

It is now pointed out that there is a showing in a bill of exception that appellant’s objections to the charge were timely presented and overruled. We have considered the points relating to the objections. They are overruled, as are all points. One of these we discuss.

The court defined “accidental injury”, as an occurrence “causing damage or harm to the physical structure of the body and such diseases or infections which result therefrom”, thus employing, substantially, the wording of the first sentence of Sec. 20 of Art. 8306, Vernon’s Ann.Civ.Stat. The definition continued, however: “which can be traced to a definite time, place and cause, including neurosis bringing about malfunctioning of the physical structure of the body if it naturally and directly results from and can be traced to such occurrence at a definite time, place and cause.”

Appellant objected to the instruction because (by failing to inquire whether the accidental injury was the producing cause of any neurosis) to include neurosis in the definition was an assumption by the court that the injury produced the neurosis, and was therefore a comment on the weight of the evidence. The jury answered the first issue as to whether appellee sustained an accidental injury (as defined on the date alleged) in the affirmative.

Whatever other objections the definition, coupled with the issue, may have been subject to, it was not subject to the objections made and briefed. The point presented urges the charge assumed causal relation between the injury alleged and neurosis. This causal relation was the subject of the inquiry, under the definition, in the first issue, i. e., whether appellee sustained an injury (defined as including neurosis). Appellant did not object to the definition as improperly accenting and placing undue stress or emphasis on neurosis. It was not subject to the objections presented. The motion for rehearing is overruled.