Case ID: nc_198/html/0107-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Adams, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

GEORGE A. LANCASTER v. B. & H. COACH LINE, Inc.
    (Filed 18 December, 1929.)
    Highways B c — Where there is evidence that unlawful rate of speed was proximate cause of injury nonsuit is properly denied.
    ■Where a passenger in a bus operated by a coach line has been injured in a collision between the bus and an automobile going in the opposite direction, driven negligently from one side of the road to the other, and there is evidence that the bus was exceeding the statutory speed limit, or was operated at such a. speed as to endanger life, limb and property, and that the injury to the plaintiff would not have occurred except for the excessive speed of the bus: Held,, 'the violation of the legal speed limit is negligence, and not merely evidence of negligence, and when the proximate cause of the injury is actionable, and the coach line may not escape liability therefor on the ground that the car with which the bus collided was also negligently driven, and a judgment as of nonsuit is properly denied.
    Appeal by defendant from Sinlc, Special Judge, at May Term, 1929, of MeckleNbukg. No error.
    This is an action for tbe recovery of damages for personal injury alleged to bave been caused by tbe defendant’s negligence in operating its bus at tbe time of its collision witb an automobile driven by J. W. Register. Tbe defense was the alleged sole negligence of Register. Tbe jury answered tbe two issues submitted in favor of tbe plaintiff, wbo was given a judgment upon tbe verdict. The defendant excepted and appealed.
    
      D. E. Henderson amd StanciU & Davis for plaintiff.
    
    
      John W. Hester for defendant.
    
   Adams, J.

Tbe defendant’s motion for nonsuit raises tbe question whether there is sufficient evidence to support tbe verdict, for it must be conceded that tbe defendant’s contentions, if accepted by tbe jury, would bave warranted a verdict against tbe plaintiff.

Tbe collision occurred on 30 March, 1928, between Newton and Con-over, tbe bus moving to tbe west and Register’s car to tbe east. Tbe plaintiff, a passenger on tbe bus, occupied tbe second seat behind tbe driver. According to bis testimony tbe highway was eighteen or twenty feet wide and was straight for half a mile. A quarter of a mile in front of the bus the approaching car was seen to be running from one side of tbe road to tbe other; and tbe plaintiff called this to tbe driver’s attention. When first seen it was on tbe wrong side of tbe road; it passed two or three times to tbe right and two or three times to tbe left. Again it went to tbe right and finally to tbe left; and soon thereafter tbe collision occurred. A few seconds before tbe impact tbe bus was moving at a rate in excess of fifty-five miles ,an hour, and at tbe moment of tbe clash, which took place near the center of the road, tbe car was turning to its right and tbe bus to its left.

Tbe driver of tbe bus testified that its speed was about thirty-five miles an hour; that be could bave stopped tbe bus within forty feet; that Register, when about eighty feet distant from tbe bus, turned again to tbe wrong side of tbe road and stayed there; and that tbe bus then slowed down to twenty or twenty-five miles an hour.

In these circumstances we cannot bold as a matter of law that there was no evidence of negligence on tbe part of tbe defendant. It is provided by statute that no person shall drive a vehicle on a highway at a greater rate of speed than forty-five miles an hour, or at such a speed as to endanger the life, limb, or property of any person. Not only is it made prima facie unlawful for .any person to exceed the speed limit; the violation of any of these provisions is made a misdemeanor. C. S., 2621 (46), 2621 (100).

The failure, without legal excuse, to obey the provisions of a statute is negligence, and such negligence when the proximate cause of an injury is actionable. Ledbetter v. English, 166 N. C., 125; Clark v. Wright, 167 N. C., 646. "Whether the negligence complained of is the proximate cause of the injury suffered is ordinarily a question for the jury. Byrd v. Express Co., 139 N. C., 273; Saunders v. R. R., 167 N. C., 375; Lea v. Utilities Co., 175 N. C., 459; Ridge v. High Point, 176 N. C., 421.

It was the contention of the plaintiff that the defendant disregarded two express inhibitions of the statute in driving fifty-five miles an hour and at such speed as to endanger life, limb, and property; that the car was light and the weight of the bus was 9,000 pounds; and that if the bus had been stopped before the collision, as it could have been, or its speed had been materially reduced, the injury would probably have been averted.

These contentions were submitted to the jury under instructions which are free from error. The defendant’s position that a breach of the provisions above set forth is only evidence of negligence is distinctly disapproved in Ledbetter v. English, supra.

The instruction which is pointed out in the fourth exception is not unfavorable to the appellant; at .any rate we find nothing in it of which the appellant can justly complain.

No error.