Title: Brown v. Roadway Express, Inc.

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

Brown v. Roadway Express, Inc. (98-280); 169 Vt. 633; 740 A.2d 352

[Filed 24-Aug-1999]

                                 ENTRY ORDER

                       SUPREME COURT DOCKET NO. 98-280

                               MAY TERM, 1999

William Brown and	               }	APPEALED FROM:
Ramona Brown	                       }
	                               }
     v.	                               }	Chittenden Superior Court
	                               }	
Roadway Express, Inc. and	       }
Michael D. Heyman	               }	DOCKET NO. S1143-96 CnC

             In the above-entitled cause, the Clerk will enter:

       This is a negligence action arising from an accident in which a
  motorcycle driven by  William Brown collided with a tractor-trailer truck
  owned by Roadway Express and driven by  Michael D. Heyman. Defendants
  Roadway Express, Inc. and Michael D. Heyman appeal from a  judgment entered
  in the Chittenden Superior Court on a jury verdict awarding plaintiffs
  William  and Ramona Brown $1,078,334.15 in compensatory damages.  The
  issues on appeal involve the  court's determination that Heyman was
  negligent as a matter of law, the court's instructions to  the jury
  concerning punitive damages and certain comments made by plaintiffs'
  counsel during  closing argument.  We affirm the judgment.

       The relevant facts are largely undisputed.  On July 13, 1995, a
  tractor-trailer truck driven  by Heyman and owned by Roadway Express was
  proceeding northbound on Route 12 en route  from Northfield to Barre. 
  Heyman was an employee of Roadway Express, acting within the  scope of his
  employment.  The accident occurred in Berlin, just north of the point where
  Route  12 crosses beneath a railway overpass.  A sign in the northbound
  lane of Route 12 warns  motorists that the overpass is 13 feet, 2 inches
  above the ground.  The truck required a clearance  of 13 feet, 6 inches. 
  Heyman, aware that his truck could clear the overpass by traveling in the 
  southbound lane but not the northbound one, drove the truck across the
  double-yellow line of the  highway and into the southbound lane, passed
  under the overpass and struck head-on the  motorcycle driven by William
  Brown.  The motorcycle driver sustained injuries, and his brother,  a
  passenger, was killed in the accident.

       In their complaint, plaintiffs sought both compensatory and punitive
  damages from  defendants.  At the conclusion of the three-day trial that
  ultimately ensued, the court instructed  the jury that both Heyman and
  Roadway Express were negligent - the former because he failed  to use due
  care in the operation of his vehicle and the latter because Heyman was an
  employee  acting in the course of his employment.  Explicitly left for the
  jury to decide was whether  defendants' negligence proximately caused any
  damages to plaintiffs, whether contributory  negligence was involved, and
  whether plaintiffs were entitled to recover any punitive damages.  

  

  The jury found no contributory negligence but awarded plaintiffs
  compensatory damages only.   Of the $1,078,334.15 awarded by the jury on
  its special verdict form, $5,000 was attributed to  damage to the
  motorcycle, $15,274.15 to past medical expenses, $8,060 to lost earnings, 
  $50,000 to Ramona Brown's loss of consortium, and $1,000,000 to all other
  past and future  damages.

       Defendants first contend that the court erred when it instructed the
  jury that defendants  were negligent as a matter of law, leaving jurors to
  decide only the questions of causation,  damages and punitive damages.  We
  discern no error.

       Negligence is failure to exercise the care that the circumstances
  reasonably require or  justly demand.  See Weaver v. Brush, 166 Vt. 98,
  102,