First off, if you think there is a problem with the way the Court of Appeal stated the facts in its decision, you need to call that to the appellate court’s attention with a petition for rehearing. Otherwise, the Supreme Court will feel free to take its “statement of facts largely from [the Court of Appeal] opinion.”
Second, be aware of what issues are encompassed in the grant of review. Today’s decision involved a question of who had the burden of proof on various issues in an eminent domain compensation proceeding. The court ruled that the burden at issue was for the production of evidence rather than proof. The analysis of the record stopped at that point, since the issue of whether the plaintiff had carried its burden of presenting evidence on the question was not included in the grant of review.
Finally, the Supreme Court punctuated this series of rulings by noting:
Having now determined the respective roles of the judge and jury in connection with severance damages and the nonexistence of a burden of persuasion with respect to such damages, we have no cause to determine whether the trial court overstepped its bounds in excluding evidence of certain severance damages prior to trial or whether the trial court erred in finding that certain other severance damages had not been established at trial, inasmuch as MWD (with one exception) has not challenged here any part of the Court of Appeal’s opinion relating to severance damages, nor did Campus Crusade challenge in its answer any such ruling by the trial court.