Judgment Notwithstanding the Verdict

Judgment notwithstanding the verdict (often abbreviated JNOV, from the Latin non obstante veredicto) is a procedural device that allows a trial judge to enter judgment for the party who lost before the jury, on the ground that the evidence at trial was legally insufficient to support the jury's conclusion. It is an exceptional remedy: courts apply it only where, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the non-moving party, no reasonable juror could have found as the jury did.

In United States federal practice, the term JNOV was formally retired in 1991, when Rule 50 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure was amended to consolidate the directed verdict and JNOV into a single mechanism called judgment as a matter of law (JMOL). Under Rule 50(a), a party may move for JMOL before the case is submitted to the jury; under Rule 50(b), the motion may be renewed after the verdict. The renewed Rule 50(b) motion is the functional successor to the old JNOV. Many U.S. state courts, however, still use the older "JNOV" terminology in their rules of civil procedure.

Key features:

• It is available in civil cases, and in criminal cases only to enter a judgment of acquittal (never to overturn an acquittal, which would violate the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment).
• It is distinct from a new trial motion, which asks the court to retry the case rather than reverse the outcome outright.
• Appellate review of a JNOV/JMOL ruling is typically de novo, since the question is one of legal sufficiency.

The doctrine is rooted in the common-law tradition and exists in various forms across jurisdictions influenced by English procedure, including parts of Canada and Australia, though civil-law systems generally lack a direct analogue because they do not use lay juries in the same way.