Case Title: Lee v. Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co.

Citation: 

Docket Number: 970970

State: virginia

Court: Virginia Supreme Court

Date: 1998-02-27T00:00:00Z

Document:
Present:  All the Justices 
 
DEBRA S. LEE, AS MOTHER AND NEXT 
FRIEND OF ROY JAMES LEE, A MINOR, 
ET AL. 
   
 
 
 
   OPINION BY JUSTICE ELIZABETH B. LACY 
v. 
Record No. 970970   
   February 27, 1998 
 
NATIONWIDE MUTUAL INSURANCE  
COMPANY 
 
FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF BOTETOURT COUNTY 
George E. Honts, III, Judge 
 
 
In this case, we consider whether the trial court 
erred in holding as a matter of law that the defense of 
illegality barred the claim for damages of a 13-year-old 
boy rather than submitting to the jury the issue of the 
boy's consent to the illegal act. 
Late in the evening of November 1, 1993, 13-year-old Roy 
James Lee locked his bedroom door and left his house, 
apparently through his bedroom window.  His parents did not 
know he was gone.  Lee went to the home of his friend, 
William Randall Slate, a high school freshman who was 16 
years old.  Around 11:00 p.m., Lee called his girlfriend, 
12-year-old Jessica Lee Fisher, and told her to take the 
keys to her mother's car from the coffee table and meet Lee 
and Slate at the basement door of her house.  Fisher's 
mother had already gone to bed.  
Fisher changed her clothes, got the keys, and met the 
boys as planned.  She gave the keys to Lee who, in turn, 
gave them to Slate.  When the group walked to Mrs. Fisher's 
car, they heard the motor running on a neighbor's car 
parked nearby.  They decided not to take Mrs. Fisher's car 
at that time because they feared being discovered.  
Instead, Lee and Slate unsuccessfully tried to take a 
motorized bicycle parked nearby.  The group then walked to 
Slate's house where they stayed for about an hour. 
When the three youths returned to Fisher's house, the 
motor of the neighbor's car was no longer running.  Fisher 
got into the back seat of her mother's car and Slate got in 
the driver's seat.  To avoid the possibility that Mrs. 
Fisher might hear the engine start, Lee pushed the car some 
distance away from its parking place.  Lee then got into 
the front passenger's seat.  For the next hour and a half, 
Slate drove the group around the area in Mrs. Fisher's car.  
Both Fisher and Lee knew that Slate had only a learner's 
driving permit.  
At some point, Fisher asked Slate to return to her 
home, and he agreed to do so.  Around 2:00 a.m. on the 
return trip, Fisher noticed that Slate was driving at a 
speed of between 40 and 45 m.p.h. and asked him to slow 
down.  She also observed a "loose gravel" sign.  
About one hour later, at 3:10 a.m., Virginia State 
Trooper Gene E. Ayers received a call to investigate an 
 
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accident on a portion of Route 605 that was under 
construction.  The road at the accident location was an 
unmarked gravel surface 15 feet wide with ditches on both 
sides.  When Trooper Ayers reached the accident scene, he 
found 270 feet of wavy tire marks in the gravel leading to 
one of the ditches.  Mrs. Fisher's car was approximately 30 
feet off the road.  Trooper Ayers found Fisher "in and out 
of consciousness" in the back seat of the car.  Lee was 
outside the car, halfway between the car and the road.  The 
temperature was below freezing and some of the blood on 
both Lee and Fisher had begun to freeze.  Slate was not at 
the scene of the accident when Ayers arrived. 
Lee suffered severe head injuries in the accident 
resulting in catastrophic, permanent brain damage, and 
permanent disability.  
 
Lee's mother, Debra S. Lee, filed a motion for 
judgment against Slate on her own behalf and on behalf of 
Lee as his next friend.  Since Slate was an uninsured 
motorist, Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company (Nationwide), 
Debra Lee's uninsured motorist insurance carrier, defended 
the action.  Nationwide filed an answer and a special plea 
asserting the defense of illegality.  At trial, on motion 
by Nationwide, the court struck Lee's evidence and held 
that, as a matter of law, Lee freely and voluntarily, 
 
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without coercion or duress, consented to participation in 
the illegal act that resulted in his injuries.  The trial 
court entered judgment in favor of Nationwide.  Lee 
appeals, claiming the trial court erred in its application 
of the illegality defense. 
The illegality defense is based on the principle that a 
party who consents to and participates in an illegal act 
may not recover from other participants for the 
consequences of that act.  Miller v. Bennett, 190 Va. 162, 
164-65, 56 S.E.2d 217, 218 (1949).  The defense will be 
applied to bar recovery if the evidence shows that the 
plaintiff freely and voluntarily consented to participation 
in the illegal act, without duress or coercion.  Trotter v. 
Okawa, 248 Va. 212, 216, 445 S.E.2d 121, 123-24 (1994).  As 
with other defenses, the party raising the defense has the 
burden to establish it. 
While none of our prior cases has involved the 
application of the defense of illegality to acts of a 
person younger than 14 years of age, Lee does not contend 
that the defense is unavailable in such cases.  Nor does 
Lee dispute that taking Mrs. Fisher's car without 
permission was an illegal act.  Rather, Lee asserts that 
the evidence presented conflicting factual issues as to 
whether Lee freely and voluntarily, without duress or 
 
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coercion, consented to participation in the illegal act, 
and, therefore, that the trial court should have submitted 
resolution of these issues to the jury rather than deciding 
them as a matter of law.  In support of his position, Lee 
argues that the trial court's error was based on both its 
failure to apply a rebuttable evidentiary presumption that 
a person between the ages of 7 and 14 is incapable of 
consenting to an illegal act and its failure to consider 
the evidence in the light most favorable to Lee.  However, 
Lee's position is not supported by either the record in 
this case or the law of this Commonwealth. 
Lee argues that minors between the ages of 7 and 14 are 
afforded the protection of certain rebuttable presumptions 
of incapacity when charged with criminal culpability, 
citing Law v. Commonwealth, 75 Va. 885, 889 (1881), or 
contributory negligence, citing Doe v. Dewhirst, 240 Va. 
266, 268, 396 S.E.2d 840, 842 (1990).  The trial court, 
according to Lee, either should have applied those 
presumptions here or created and applied an ad hoc 
rebuttable presumption based on the circumstances of this 
case.  We disagree. 
Neither of the above standards is applicable to a 
determination of whether a person has engaged in an illegal 
act, for purposes of the illegality defense.  That 
 
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determination is an objective inquiry.  See Zysk v. Zysk, 
239 Va. 32, 35, 404 S.E.2d 721, 722 (1990).  However, 
whether the defense will be applied requires more than a 
simple showing that the plaintiff committed the illegal 
act.  As we have said, the defendant must also prove that 
the plaintiff consented to the commission of the illegal 
act and engaged in it, freely and voluntarily, without 
duress or coercion.  This evidentiary burden necessarily 
includes consideration of the maturity, intelligence, and 
mental capacity of the plaintiff, regardless of age.  Given 
this burden of proof, the rebuttable presumption suggested 
by Lee would serve no additional purpose and would provide 
no additional protection to the minor plaintiff.  Thus, 
there is no legal basis or persuasive rationale for 
imposing the type of presumption suggested by Lee, and the 
trial court correctly declined to do so. 
We now turn to Lee's assertion that the evidence of 
voluntary consent, duress, and coercion was in conflict, 
and therefore, the trial court should have submitted the 
issue to the jury.  Viewing the evidence in the light most 
favorable to Lee, as we must when reviewing a motion to 
strike, Austin v. Shoney's, Inc., 254 Va. 134, 135, 486 
S.E.2d 285, 285 (1997); Meador v. Lawson, 214 Va. 759, 761, 
204 S.E.2d 285, 287 (1974), we conclude that the trial 
 
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court did not err in holding that reasonable persons could 
not disagree that Lee freely and voluntarily, without 
duress or coercion, consented to his participation in an 
illegal act. 
The record shows that Lee was capable of understanding 
the nature of his acts and had the ability to make choices 
about his behavior.  At the time of the illegal act, Lee 
was almost 14 years old.  He performed at an average level 
in school and was capable of better performance.  His 
behavior at school was average, and he played on organized 
sports teams.  He complied with his parents' directions not 
to ride a motorized bicycle under certain circumstances.  
While described as a "follower" in his relationship with 
Slate, there is no evidence to support a finding that Lee 
was incapable of withholding consent or making other 
choices regarding his behavior.  
With regard to the incident in question, the record 
shows that, outside the presence of Slate, Lee actively 
planned to take Mrs. Fisher's car and referred to the plan 
as "steal[ing]" the car when talking to Fisher.  He told 
Fisher to take the keys, locked his bedroom door to avoid 
detection, and left his home through his bedroom window.  
He turned the keys over to Slate.  Lee pushed the car away 
from Fisher's house to avoid detection and, according to 
 
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Fisher's testimony, during the ride in Mrs. Fisher's car, 
never tried to stop Slate, alter the way Slate was driving, 
or get out of the car.∗
Lee argues that his actions were taken, not freely and 
voluntarily, but under duress and coercion by Slate.  Lee 
relies on Fisher's testimony that Slate was the "leader" 
and Lee the "follower," that Lee wanted to impress Slate, 
that Lee would not get into trouble unless Slate was 
present, and that Lee would "act differently" when Slate 
was around.  Lee also relies on Fisher's testimony that 
when Lee called her to plan the taking of her mother's car, 
she heard Slate in the background directing Lee to "tell me 
if we didn't take Mom's car, then they were going to bust 
out the windshield." 
 
This evidence suggests that when Lee was with Slate he 
engaged in activity which he might not have undertaken by 
himself or with others.  This evidence does not, however, 
support a conclusion that the change in Lee's demeanor or 
his actions were the result of coercion or duress by Slate, 
or that Lee had no control over his actions when he was 
with Slate.  Rather, the evidence suggests that Lee engaged 
in actions which he believed would impress Slate and keep 
                     
∗ Lee has no memory of the accident or the events 
surrounding it. 
 
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Slate as his friend.  No expert evidence was presented that 
Slate's relationship with or influence on Lee in some way 
deprived Lee of his ability to make choices about his 
actions either on the night in question or at any other 
time.  Therefore, we conclude that, based on the record, 
the trial court was correct when it decided that reasonable 
persons could not disagree that Lee consented to his 
participation in an illegal act and that the illegality 
defense barred his recovery for injuries sustained as a 
result of that illegal act. 
 
Accordingly, the judgment of the trial court will be 
affirmed. 
Affirmed. 
 
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