Court Opinion

ID: 9762003
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 02:07:07.603431+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:29.062995
License: Public Domain

Concurring Opinion by
Hoffman, J. :
Appellant contends that the trial judge erred in instructing the jury that the decedent was presumed to have exercised due care at the time that the accident occurred.
This action arose out of a collision between an automobile operated by plaintiff-appellant, Wayne Dilliplaine, and a car operated by defendant-appellee’s decedent James Burdette. Burdette died following the accident from causes unrelated to the accident.
When an individual suffers a violent death, there is a presumption that the deceased exercised due care in the actions preceding his death. Watkins v. Prudential Insurance Company, 315 Pa. 497, 173 A. 644 (1934); Groh v. Philadelphia Electric Company, 441 Pa. 345, 271 A. 2d 265 (1970). This is a presumption of fact which has no evidentiary value and gives way in the face of evidence to the contrary. Watkins, supra, at 315 Pa. 497, 500-503. This presumption is founded in the belief that men so cherish Ufe and fear death that they will act carefully to avoid the horror of death. Morin v. Kreidt, 310 Pa. 90, 97, 164 A. 799 (1933); Watkins, supra, at 315 Pa. 497, 509. Social policy mandates that where a death may be the result of either suicide or accident, the law should presume accidental death; such a presumption inclines “toward the fruition rather than the frustration of plans for family protection through life insurance.” McCormick, Law of Evidence at 643 (1954).
“The so-called ‘presumption against suicide’ is neither a procedural expedient (1) nor a rule rooted in the consideration that one of the litigants has posses*247sion of the most available evidence determinative of the issue trying (2), nor is it a conclusion based on the known results of wide human experience (3). It is merely a permissible consideration of the nonprobability of death by suicide.” Watkins, supra, at 315 Pa. 505.
A jury instruction to the effect that the decedent exercised due care has always been given to benefit a decedent who has established a prima facie case of negligence wherein the defendant alleges contributory negligence.1 The presumption is also applicable where a party loses his memory or is unable to testify as a result of injuries sustained in the accident. Heaps v. Southern Pennsylvania Traction Co., 276 Pa. 551, 120 A. 548 (1923); Auel v. White, 389 Pa. 208, 213-214, 132 A. 2d 350 (1957). The courts equate the party’s inability to testify with his death. Where the party is only injured and not killed as a result of the accident, there is no possibility that a decedent’s family will lose death benefits. In both instances, however, the love of life is presumed to motivate the party to act with due care. Heaps, supra, 276 Pa. at 553.
This presumption is merely the converse of charging the jury that the plaintiff has the burden of proving negligence and the defendant has the burden of proving contributory negligence. Thus, such an instruction adds nothing to a jury’s ability to intelligently and impartially decide a case. Instead, such a charge, may befuddle the issues should the jury misunderstand *248the weight to be given the presumption. The presumption of due care is a presumption of fact which in reality is not a presumption at all. Watkins, supra, 315 Pa. at 500-501. “The employment here of the term ‘presumption’ is due simply to historical usage, by which ‘presumption’ was originally a term equivalent, in one sense to ‘inference.’ . . . There is in truth but one kind of presumption; and the term ‘presumption of fact’ should be discarded as useless and confusing. . . .” Watkins, supra, 315 Pa. at 501.
Given the admittedly confusing nature of this presumption, this Court should refuse to expand the applicability of the presumption. This Court has refused to allow instructions to a jury on the presumption of due care where a party’s alleged failure of memory was not the result of injuries incurred in the accident in question. Snyder v. Union Paving Co., 170 Pa. Superior Ct. 112, 84 A. 2d 373 (1951). In interpreting Pennsylvania law, Federal Courts have refused to give a presumption of due care charge in cases where the decedent’s death was not a result of the accident. Webb v. Martin, 364 F. 2d 229 (3d Cir. 1966); Brain v. Elliott-Spicher Motors, Inc., 249 F. Supp. 695 (W.D. Pa., 1966). Indeed, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court stated : “There is a presumption of due care on the part of a decedent whose death or inability to testify occurs only by reason of accident.” Lyons v. Bodek Estate, 393 Pa. 131, 133, 142 A. 2d 199 (1958) (emphasis added).
This presumption only has the capacity to confuse the jury and becloud the issues. There is no reason for the court to expand the applicability of the presumption to cases where a defendant’s death arose out of causes unrelated to the accident.
The appellant only made a general exception to the charge, but the principle has long been established that *249a new trial will be granted, even in the absence of a general exception, when the improper charge constitutes basic and fundamental error. Patterson v. Pittsburgh Railways Co., 322 Pa. 125, 128, 185 A. 283 (1936). Nevertheless, giving the presumption of due care instruction did not constitute basic and fundamental error. Thus, the decision of the lower court not to grant a new trial should be affirmed.
Spaulding and Cercone, JJ., join in this concurring opinion.

 Glancy v. McKees Rocks Borough, 243 Pa. 216, 89 A. 972 (1914); Yuhasz v. Pittsburgh Construction Company, 305 Pa. 166, 157 A. 461 (1931); Morin v. Kreidt, supra; Michener v. Lewis, 314 Pa. 156, 170 A. 272 (1934); Susser v. Wiley, 350 Pa. 427, 39 A. 2d 616 (1944); Lear v. Shirk’s Motor Express Corp., 397 Pa. 144, 152 A. 2d 883 (1959); Skoda v. West Penn Power Co., 411 Pa. 323, 191 A. 2d 376 (1963); Allison v. Snelling, 425 Pa. 519, 229 A. 2d 861 (1967).