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State v. United States Steel Corp.6/24/1996
give its instruction regarding the lack of a privity requirement in a claim for unfair or deceptive acts or practices in the conduct of trade or commerce in violation of HRS chapter 480. The state's proposed instruction provided that "no contract between U.S. Steel and the State of Hawaii is necessary to make U.S. Steel liable for unfair and deceptive trade practices." The state contends that the trial court's refusal to give the instruction was prejudicial because USX emphasized in its opening statements that there was no contractual relationship or privity between USX and the state. We disagree.
We have previously noted that "it is prejudicial error for the court to refuse to give an instruction relevant under the evidence which correctly states the law unless the point is adequately and fully covered by other instructions given by the court." Agee v. Kahului Trucking & Storage, Inc., 67 Haw. 365, 369, 688 P.2d 256, 259 (1984) (citation omitted). Although the state is ostensibly correct that the instruction correctly stated the law, we hold, for two reasons, that the principle communicated in the state's proposed instruction is adequately and fully covered by other instructions given by the court.
First, the court's instruction no. 36 was a complete and correct statement of the elements of a claim for unfair or deceptive acts or practices in the conduct of any trade or commerce. Instruction no. 36 specifically delineated what the jury needed to find in order to render USX liable and did not list the presence of a contract, or privity of contract, between USX and the state as an element. The court was not obliged to do more. To hold that the court's refusal to give the state's proposed instruction in the present case was error effectively would require trial courts to give an instruction regarding what is not required regarding the elements of a claim.
Second, the state's claim of prejudice stemming from the court's failure to give its proposed instruction, based on USX's emphasis, during its opening statements, on the fact that USX did not have a contract with the state, nor was USX ever in privity of contract with the state, is addressed by other instructions given by the court. The court's instruction no. 4 provided that "statements, arguments, and remarks of counsel are intended to help you in understanding the evidence and in applying the law, but they are not evidence. You should disregard any such utterance that has no basis in the evidence." Moreover, the claimed "emphasis" in USX's opening statements of lack of privity was mild at best. The state points to the following passages in USX's opening statements:
U.S. Steel had little to do with this stadium . . . . Never once at any time ever did any representative of U.S. Steel come to this island and deal with anybody from either the State or the City. Never once -- and the record will show this completely -- was there any correspondence between anybody for the State or the City . . . and U.S. Steel.
And we had nothing at all to do, U.S. Steel did not, with respect to the construction. . . . And never once during that process were we asked ever to come here and do anything. Nor would it have been appropriate, since we had no contract with either the State or the consulting engineers or with the contractor.
(State's emphasis.) Contrary to the state's position, at least based on the above-quoted passages from USX's opening statements, it appears that USX's theory of defense was the lack of any contact between itself and the state, and not specifically the lack of a contract or privity of contract; the reference to the la
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