Court Opinion

ID: 9653325
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 17:44:06.48237+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:57.858361
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
In deference to appellants’ request we elaborate our statement that “all testimony” of Officer Nunn showing the speed limit to be less than authorized by statute was properly excluded to specify that evidence of traffic signs along the highway reading “Speed limit 45 miles per hour” was inadmissible to vary the speed limits fixed by general law.
Appellants vigorously contend that the evidence that appellee was charged with speeding and sent a check to the City in payment of the speeding fine should have been admitted as an admission against interest and this without regard to the validity of the court proceedings. We recognize the force of this contention but do not consider a decision of the question required since such admission, if such it be, was cumulative of appellee’s testimony upon the trial. He was charged in Corporation Court with driving 52 miles per hour and paid a fine on that basis. He testified that he was driving between 45 and 55 miles per hour. These speeds were not over the lawful maximum and it is our opinion that appellants were not prejudiced by the exclusion of the court proceedings or testimony pertaining thereto.
Appellants complain of our holding that Mrs. Mooneyhan could not, under the circumstances recover, saying that we held that “she assented to any injury she might suffer as a proximate result of the negligence of appellee, who was not her host but the driver of another vehicle” and they request that we “explain on what theory of law or logic this Court holds that Mrs. Mooneyhan, by entering the automobile of one drunken driver with imputed knowledge ©f his drunken condition, assented to being *745injured by the proximately contributing negligence of the drunken driver of an entirely different automobile.”
We do not believe our opinion to be subject to the criticism appellants make. We did not hold that Mrs. Mooneyhan was responsible for any one’s conduct but her own. She was dead drunk and the driver of the car in which she was riding was intoxicated and his intoxication contributed to the collision. The reasons for holding she cannot recover under these circumstances are fully stated in the cases cited in our original opinion.
Appellants complain of our holding, on the one hand, that their “failure to complain of the failure of the jury to answer the special issue inquiring whether the drunken condition of appellee was a proximate cause of the collision bars appellants’ recovery in this Court, while on the other hand holding as a matter of law that the drunken condition of appellant’s host driver was a proximate cause of the collision in question as a matter of law when no issues were even submitted on such questions. If, as this Court holds, the drunken driving of appellant’s host was a proximate cause of the collision as a matter of law, then clearly the drunken driving of appellee was also a proximate cause of the collision as a matter of law.”
We did not hold that appellants could not recover because the jury failed to find that appellee’s intoxication was a proximate cause of the collision. Our decision would be the same if we assumed or held as appellants suggest we should. It goes without repeating, however, that the evidence as to intoxication being a proximate cause of the collision is entirely different as to each driver.
Our duty is to affirm the trial court’s judgment if we can do so under any theory consistent with the law and the facts. Also, we do not decide questions unnecessary to a disposition of a case.' These are fundamental matters.
The motion is overruled.
Motion overruled.