CAREY v GRUZMAN [1991] NSWCA 45

CAREY v GRUZMAN

SUPREME COURT OF NEW SOUTH WALES COURT OF APPEAL

SAMUELS, PRIESTLEY and MEAGHER JJA 31 October 1990, 10 April 1991 [1991] NSWCA 45

DAMAGES FOR PERSONAL INJURY — plaintiff injured in car accident -liability admitted — injury affected capacity to work — plaintiff had earlier suffered unrelated injuries also affecting work capacity. APPEAL AND CROSS APPEAL — trial judge's findings of fact concerning effects of accident challenged — also his conclusions on medical evidence — no reason shown by appellant/ defendant for changing trial judge's conclusion — similarly plaintiff's cross appeal not made out.

Samuels JA Mr Neville Gruzman (whom I will call "the plaintiff') was born on 14 November 1925 and is a distinguished architect. Towards the end of 1983 the Royal Australian Institute of Architects offered him a 'retrospective' which was held in November and December of that year and included twenty five buildings which the plaintiff had designed between 1949 and 1983. He was, we were told, the first living architect ever to be invited by the Royal Australian Institute to accept a retrospective showing of his works. This was an unique honour, but an expensive one since it cost him $50,000 "to mount the exhibition altogether." In November 1982, when he suffered the injuries in a motor car accident which form the subject matter of this claim, he regarded himself as at the height of his professional powers and ready to extend his capacity for innovative architectural design beyond the boundaries of scale which his own preferences had previously set.

Unfortunately, in that year and the previous year, the plaintiff had met with a number of earlier physical misfortunes whose influence upon his capacity to work was a significant issue in the case. In August 1981 while travelling in Sri Lanka he contracted a viral disease and spent six weeks in St Vincent's Hospital, and a further eight to ten weeks or thereabouts at home recovering from its effects. On 16 November 1981 he struck his head on some scaffolding at a building site in Turramurra, and on 5 January 1982 was admitted to Sydney Hospital for surgical treatment of the serious consequences of that occurrence. On 6 January 1982 he commenced receiving workers' compensation payments from the company, Gruzman Pty Ltd, by which he was employed and through which he conducted his architectural practice. Then, in September 1982, he suffered a heart attack and underwent a quadruple coronary bypass operation. On 21 November 1982 he was involved in the car accident for which the defendants admitted liability, and in which he received injuries to the neck, back, right shoulder and left leg which, so the plaintiff asserts, have almost wholly destroyed his earning capacity and his ability to pursue the art Which had previously filled his life and to which he was entirely dedicated.