Case Title: Thoen v. LANESBORO SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 229

Citation: 209 N.W.2d 924

Docket Number: 

State: minnesota

Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

Date: 1973-05-25T00:00:00Z

Document:
209 N.W.2d 924 (1973) Amos THOEN, Appellant, v. LANESBORO SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 229, et al., Respondents. No. 43526. Supreme Court of Minnesota. May 25, 1973. Rehearing Denied August 22, 1973. *925 Peterson & Challeen, Winona, Carroll Cronan Roth & Austin and Thomas A. Foster, Minneapolis, for appellant. Fitzgerald Fitzgerald & Crandall, Patrick W. Fitzgerald, and William Crandall, Minneapolis, for respondents. Heard before KNUTSON, C. J., and ROGOSHESKE, PETERSON, and MacLAUGHLIN, JJ. PER CURIAM. Plaintiff, Amos Thoen, appeals from the denial of a new trial in a negligence action where the jury found that defendant Lanesboro School District No. 229, through its employee, defendant LaMoine Hatton, was 50 percent negligent and that plaintiff was also 50 percent negligent. We reverse. On April 5, 1968, plaintiff was struck by a school bus owned by defendant school district and driven by defendant Hatton. The accident occurred within the village limits of Lanesboro on State Highway No. 250 near a stone quarry while plaintiff and a coworker were installing a power pole near the road. Although their employer, Lanesboro Public Utility Commission, furnished "hard hats," neither plaintiff nor his coworker was wearing one. Pursuant to the jury's special verdict that plaintiff's damages were $153,000 but that both plaintiff and defendant Hatton were each 50 percent negligent, judgment was ordered in favor of defendants. Plaintiff moved for an order setting aside certain answers in the special verdict and substituting other answers or for a new trial, contending, among other things, that (a) the trial court failed to adequately instruct the jury concerning defense counsel's allegedly prejudicial argument to the jury in which counsel said that plaintiff's failure to wear a hard hat constituted negligence, and (b) the court improperly failed to instruct that the speed limit in the area of the accident was 30 miles an hour. *926 1. Although plaintiff's employer supplied him with a hard hat, plaintiff was not wearing one at the time of the accident. Plaintiff suffered serious head injuries in the accident. Defendants' counsel argued to the jury: Plaintiff objected to the hard-hat argument and requested a correcting instruction. The trial court agreed to instruct the jury that there is no requirement under the law that a pedestrian wear a hard hat. The court instructed the jury as follows: The instruction is contradictory. The trial court said that no law required plaintiff to wear a hard hat but then implied that failure to wear a hard hat is one of the circumstances which can be considered in deciding whether the "conduct of the parties" constitutes negligence. Since plaintiff's failure to wear a hard hat did not expose him to any foreseeable risk of being struck by a school bus, defendants' argument to the jury that failure to wear a hard hat constituted negligence was improper. See, Denson v. McDonald, 144 Minn. 252, 175 N.W. 108 (1919). The jury found that plaintiff suffered $153,000 damages and that both plaintiff and defendants were 50 percent *927 negligent. Under Minnesota's comparative negligence law, Minn.St. 604.01, a difference of one percentage point in the jury's allocation of negligence (i. e., plaintiff, 49 percent negligent; defendant, 51 percent negligent) would result in plaintiff's recovering about $78,000 rather than nothing. Thus, even if the improper argument had only a small effect on the jury, plaintiff could have been seriously prejudiced. The trial court's instruction which attempted to correct the improper argument was ambiguous and unclear and could have left the jury confused as to what weight should be put on the fact that plaintiff wore no hard hat. We therefore reverse and remand for a new trial. 2. Plaintiff contends that the trial court improperly refused to instruct the jury that § 169.14, subd. 2, placed a 30-miles-an-hour speed limit at the accident scene. Section 169.14, subd. 2, provides in part: For purposes of c. 169, "urban district" is defined as Plaintiff points to no evidence that the scene of the accident fits into the statutory definition of "urban district." The evidence does not show that there were any structures near the accident but only that the accident occurred near a stone quarry. Aerial pictures of the area support defendants' contention that this was not an "urban district." A refusal to give a requested instruction is not error where the evidence will not sustain a finding of facts essential to make the instruction applicable. Meagher v. Kavli, 256 Minn. 54, 97 N.W.2d 370 (1959). Reversed and remanded.