Case ID: ny-2d_14/html/0907-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Dye, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

In the Matter of Adam J. Good, Respondent-Appellant, v. William S. Hults, as Commissioner of Motor Vehicles, Appellant-Respondent.
    Argued June 9, 1964;
    decided July 10, 1964.
    
      
      Louis J. Lefkowitz, Attorney-General (Philip J. Fitzgerald and Paxton Blair of counsel), for appellant-respondent.
    
      Edward M. Segal for respondent-appellant.
   Order of Appellate Division modified insofar as it directs suspension of petitioner’s license, and the Commissioner’s determination annulled upon the ground that there is no substantial evidence to support it.

Concur: Judges Fuld, Van Voorhis, Burke and Scileppi. Judge Dye dissents and votes to reverse and to reinstate the determination of the Commissioner in the following opinion in which Chief Judge Desmond and Judge Bergan concur.

Dye, J.

(dissenting). I dissent and vote to reverse and to reinstate the determination of the Commissioner of Motor Vehicles. The term “ gross negligence ”, as used in the statute, is negligence in the operation of a motor vehicle “in a manner showing a reckless disregard for life or property of others ” (Vehicle and Traffic Law, § 510, subd. 3, par. [e]). Concededly, the petitioner violated section 1126 of the Vehicle and Traffic Law in that he crossed a double traffic line; section 1121 in that he parked his vehicle in the left lane open for southbound vehicles without giving approaching vehicles “ at least one-half of the * * * roadway”, and subdivision 3 of section 375 in that he failed to put his headlights on low beam. In face of such violations, the use of the phrase ‘‘ gross negligence ’ ’ does not vitiate the determination, since the Commissioner had authority to revoke the license ‘‘ for any violation of the provisions of this chapter, except [§ 1192] ” (§ 510, subd. 3, par. [2]). The determination following the hearing was that the petitioner’s operator’s license should be revoked. There was substantial evidence to justify that administrative determination (Matter of Donahue v. Fletcher, 299 N. Y. 227).

Ordered accordingly.