Case Name: John E. DOVE, Sr. et ux., v. Joseph P. MESSINA et al.
Court: Louisiana Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Louisiana
Decision Date: 1969-11-17
Citations: 230 So. 2d 615
Docket Number: No. 7774
Parties: John E. DOVE, Sr. et ux., v. Joseph P. MESSINA et al.
Judges: Before LOTTINGER, REID and BLANCHE, JJ.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 230
Pages: 615–623

Head Matter:
John E. DOVE, Sr. et ux., v. Joseph P. MESSINA et al.
No. 7774.
Court of Appeal of Louisiana. First Circuit.
Nov. 17, 1969.
Rehearing Denied Dec. 22, 1969.
Dissenting Opinion Jan. 26, 1970.
Writ Refused Feb. 27, 1970.
William A. Norfolk, of Taylor, Porter, Brooks, Fuller & Phillips, Baton Rouge, for defendant-appellant.
E. Clark Gaudin, of Smith & Gaudin, Baton Rouge, for plaintiff-appellee.
Before LOTTINGER, REID and BLANCHE, JJ.

Opinion:
LOTTINGER, Judge.
This is a suit by John E. Dove and his wife, Mildred P. Dove, for property damages and personal injuries resulting from an automobile accident. The defendants are Joseph P. Messina, the owner of a cane truck, and his insurer, the Travelers Insurance Company. After trial the Lower Court gave judgment in favor of petitioners and against defendants, and the defendants have appealed. The petitioners have not appealed nor have they answered the appeal.
On the morning of October 15, 1967, at approximately seven o'clock a. m., petitioner, Mrs. Dove, was driving slowly, because of heavy fog, in a northerly direction on Louisiana State Highway No. 1 in the Parish of Pointe Coupee, State of Louisiana. It is contended by petitioner that at the time of the accident she was traveling some five to ten miles per hour because of the heavy fog. A truck belonging to defendant, Joseph P. Messina, but driven by his employee, Noah Osborne, Jr., was following the petitioner's vehicle on Louisiana State Highway No. 1, and was also proceeding in a northerly direction but at a speed of approximately twenty-five to thirty miles per hour. Osborne testified that he did not notice petitioner's vehicle until he got about twenty feet behind it and he immediately attempted to swerve to the left in order to avoid striking the Dove automobile. The right rear wheel of the cane truck, however, struck the left rear of the automobile causing the automobile to flip onto its top. As stated before, at the time of the accident there was a heavy fog and the highway was wet.
The defendant's version of the accident is that Osborne was driving in his right-hand northbound lane of traffic at a speed of twenty-five to thirty miles per hour when the truck suddenly came upon the Dove vehicle which was illegally stopped on the highway in the northbound lane. It is therefore contended by defendants that the petitioner driver, Mrs. Dove, was guilty of contributory negligence in illegally stopping in the traveled portion of the highway in violation of R.S. 32:141 (A) and that she, therefore, should be denied recovery.
Following the accident, Mrs. Dove's trousers caught fire and the greatest part of her injuries consisted of burns. The Trial Court awarded petitioner $7,500 for personal injuries, plus specials, from which the defendants have perfected this appeal.
The specifications of error claimed by defendants are as follows:
(1) The court erred in giving any credence to any testimony given by plaintiff, Mildred P. Dove.
(2) The court erred in failing to hold that plaintiff was guilty of contributory negligence proximately causing the accident, in stopping her automobile on the highway.
(3) The court erred in awarding damages for burns when plaintiff failed to prove that the burns were caused by the accident.
We have not been favored with a written opinion by the Lower Court. We are, therefore, unable to tell what weight the Lower Court gave to the testimony of Mrs. Dove, or whether it gave her testimony any weight whatsoever. There was no real variation of Mrs. Dove's testimony with that of some of the other witnesses as to the fact of whether she was proceeding at a speed of some five or ten miles per hour at the time of the accident or whether she was stopped, as is contended by defendant. At least three other witnesses other than Mrs. Dove testified that it was apparent to them that Mrs. Dove was not stopped at the time of the accident as there were no scuff marks on the highway and had the automobile been stopped there would have been scuff marks on the highway. The only testimony to the effect that she was stopped on the highway at the time of the accident was that of Noah Osborne, the driver of the truck, who testified uncertainly that when he first saw the automobile it appeared to him that it was stopped. Osborne first noticed the Dove automobile only a split second before the impact during which time he was busy trying to avoid the collision. His testimony on this point was only a supposition and the Trial Court was correct in rejecting it in favor of the overwhelming contrary evidence.
A great weight of the testimony was to the effect that Mrs. Dove was proceeding at a slow rate of speed because of the fog at the time of the accident. We find her guilty of no contributory negligence which would have resulted in this accident.
The only other bone of contention before us is as to the cause of Mrs. Dove's slacks catching on fire. There is considerable testimony and evidence in the record to the effect that there were no burns on the automobile itself and that evidently the only fire was to Mrs. Dove's person.
The defendants introduced Mr. Robert L. Craxton, an experienced auto appraiser, who examined the automobile several months after the accident, at a time when many of the parts of this wrecked vehicle had been sold by the junk yard at which it was stored, and who testified that he examined the automobile and found no indication or evidence either inside or outside of any fire or fire damage. Mr. William Adams, Jr., viewed and photographed the interior of the car and he claimed that he saw no fire damage. Mr. Floyd A. Gra-vier, who testified on behalf of petitioners, stated that he and Mr. Dove went to examine the automobile following the accident and that under the hood, near the ignition, where the wires go through the fire wall, there was evidence of a small flash type of fire. Mr. Richard Bello, whose home was just a few feet from the scene of the accident, and who was one of the first to appear on the scene, testified that it looked to him that the driver's seat was charred a little bit.
The defendants, however, contend, with no evidence to support their contention, that Mrs. Dove might have been lighting or smoking a cigarette at the time of impact and put herself on fire. But Mrs. Dove testified that she did not smoke, and no one testified as to seeing a cigarette or cigarette butts in the automobile. But let us suppose, for the purpose of argument, that Mrs. Dove was in the process of lighting or was smoking a cigarette at the time she was struck by the truck, and that the force of the impact caused her to drop the lighted match or cigarette setting her trousers on fire. This would not impose the fault for the fire on Mrs. Dove, the cause of the fire would still rest upon the negligence of the truck driver.
Furthermore, the evidence discloses that the impact flipped the Dove automobile over on its top and that it skidded upside down for several feet up the highway. It could have been the sparks from the metal grinding against the concrete which inflamed Mrs. Dove's slacks. In any event, there is no evidence whatsoever to show that Mrs. Dove's slacks were on fire prior to the impact, and she was on fire following, and so the reasonable conclusion would be that the accident caused the fire.
Although there was some evidence that Mrs. Dove had been drinking sometime prior to the accident, there is nothing in the record to show that this was a contributing cause of the accident. We believe that the facts of the present case bring it within the ruling of Hernandez v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company, La.App., 192 So.2d 679 in which the Court stated:
"The jurisprudence of this state is firmly established to the effect that when visibility is materially impaired because of smoke, mist, dust, fog or other atmospheric conditions, a motorist is held to a duty of operating his vehicle with an unusually high degree of care. He should reduce his rate of speed to such an extent, and keep his car under such control as to reduce to a minimum the possibility of accident from collision. And, as an extreme measure of safety, it is his duty when visibility ahead is not possible or is greatly obscured, to stop his car and remain at a standstill until conditions warrant going forward. He does not have the right to assume that his course of travel is free from danger or obstruction in the absence of his ability to see clearly ahead, and if he continues to travel as if he knew there was perfect clearance ahead, he does so at his own risk and peril. Culpepper v. Leonard Truck Lines, Inc., 208 La. 1084, 24 So.2d 148; Demerest v. Travelers Insurance Co., 234 La. 1048, 102 So.2d 451; Ardoin v. Southern Farm Bureau Casualty Ins. Co., 133 So.2d 129 (La.App.3d Cir. 1961); and Moses v. Mosley, 146 So.2d 263 (La.App.3d Cir. 1962.)"
Again in Ervin v. Burns, La.App., 126 So. 2d 805 where the preceding vehicle had slowed to a speed of ten miles per hour when it was struck by a following truck whose driver testified that he was going fifteen to twenty miles per hour, and citing R.S. 32:234, subd. A, the Court said:
"Under LSA-R.S. 32:234, subd. A, it is the duty of a driver of a motor vehicle not to follow another vehicle more closely than is reasonable and prudent, with due regard to the speed of such vehicle and with consideration to the traffic and the condition of the highway. Obviously, the existence of a dense fog, screening one's view of the highway, is a condition requiring the exercise of the utmost caution and prudence. It is generally recognized in the jurisprudence that a driver of an automobile is under a duty to stop his car when his vision is entirely obscured by a temporary obstruction such as a cloud of dust or smoke. When failure to do so would jeopardize the safety of others, then he must stop and remain at a standstill until the obstruction to his view has come to an end. It is likewise a rule well established that, where a motorist finds himself blinded, whether by bright lights, smoke, dust, fog, or for any other reason, it is his duty to at least bring his vehicle under such control that it can be stopped in a moment in case of emergency, and, in extreme cases, it is his duty to stop.
In the instant case, the plaintiff's driver either stopped her vehicle or slackened her speed (and it is immaterial which she did) because of the condition created by the smoke obscuring her vision. The vision of defendant's driver was likewise affected and had been so obscured for an appreciable length of time, during which, even under those conditions, he traveled at least a mile. His duty was identical with that of hers to slacken his speed and/or stop, if necessary, because of his inability to see ahead, and prevent crashing into a forward car. The actions of the driver of the forward car in reducing her speed and/or stopping her car were only the exercise of precaution which defendant's driver should have likewise exercised.
Nor do we find any merit in defendants' plea that plaintiff's driver was guilty of contributory negligence. The record reveals to our satisfaction, as it did to the trial judge, that she followed a most reasonable course and acted with prudence in either greatly reducing her speed or stopping her car when she drove into the heavy smoke."
Under the above jurisprudence, we find that the Lower Court did not err in holding the driver of the cane truck guilty of negligence which was the proximate cause of the accident and the resulting injuries. Furthermore, there is nothing in the records which indicates any contributory negligence on the part of Mrs. Dove, and certainly the defendants have failed to sustain any burden of proof in this regard. In Demerest v. Travelers Insurance Company, 234 La. 1048, 102 So.2d 451, the Court said:
"Contributory negligence is a special defense, and the defendant carries the burden of establishing it by a preponderance of the evidence." (emphasis added)
We find that the sole proximate cause of this accident was the negligence of Noah Osborne, Jr., in traveling at an excessive rate of speed in view of the heavy-fog conditions.
Following the accident, Mrs. Dove was taken to and treated at Baton Rouge General Hospital by Dr. Thomas Roberts. While under his care, she received whirlpool baths twice daily at Baton Rouge General. During this period of treatment she testified that she experienced extreme pain from these burn injuries. She was referred to Dr. Arthur A. Mauterer, a vascular surgeon, during November of 1967. At the time Dr. Mauterer first examined Mrs. Dove she had the result of eschars from the drying of the burns. The burns were apparently third degree burns and certainly deep second degree burns. He described the burns as approximately ten to twelve centimeters in length as to the smaller one and the larger one being twenty to twenty-two centimeters in length, and each being six to seven centimeters wide. Dr. Mauterer admitted Mrs. Dove to the hospital to surgery on November 16, 1967. On November 17, 1967, he debrided the eschars under spinal anethesia and proceeded to use wet dressings to promote the granulation tissue to form. He took her back to surgery on December 5, 1967, when excessive granulation was removed and again on December 7,1967, for grafting the interior surface of the left and right leg. Thus three operations were performed. She remained in the hospital on this occasion until December 18, 1967. He gave her ten per cent disability as a result of these injuries, and stated she will have some discomfort from the tightness of the burn sites.
The Lower Court awarded Mrs. Dove the sum of $7,500 as damages for her personal injuries. In view of the severity of her injuries, we do not feel that the Lower Court erred in this regard.
The Lower Court also awarded damages to Mr. Dove in the sum of $4,009.48, all items of which were stipulated by counsel prior to trial on the merits.
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the Lower Court will be affirmed, all cost of this appeal to be paid by defendant.
Judgment affirmed.
Rehearing denied.