Court Opinion

ID: 9844929
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 03:11:48.331859+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:15:47.371676
License: Public Domain

PARKER, J.,
dissenting. Mrs. Ella Garrett Beard, a witness for plaintiff, asked defendant at the hospital after- Mrs. Rebecca Kennedy had been carried there this question; “Why did you do it; didn’t you see them?” He replied: “Yes, I saw them, but I thought they had stopped.”
At the hospital this occurred in the presence of Miss Ida Garrett, her sister, Mrs. Bums and defendant: “My sister asked Mr. Royal why he run over us. He said that he did not see u's when we stopped in the middle of the street, he saw us when we 'hesitated, but he thought we turned back. He did not say ai thing about us as to when he saw us for the second time. But he did tell me that he -saw myself and Mrs. Kennedy in the middle of the street and thought we had turned back, that is right. My sister heard it.”
Ramsey Street is about 40 feet wide, and is practically level and straight, where the two ladies were struck. After Miss Ida Garrett was knocked down, she was next to the curbing, and Mrs. Kennedy was to her left. Other facts are stated in .the majority opinion. These two elderly ladies were hurrying .across the street as fast as they could from Mrs. Kennedy’s home to attend prayer meeting at a neighbor’s home.
Plaintiff, in reply to the defense of contributory negligence alleged in the answer, has invoked the doctrine of last clear chance. It seems to me from a study of the evidence and considering it in the light most favorable to plaintiff, that these inferences may be legitimately drawn therefrom: Defendant was negligent, Mrs. Rebecca Kennedy was guilty of contributory negligence, but that, although Mrs. Kennedy had negligently placed herself in a .position of peril from which she could not escape by the exercise of reasonable care, the defendant knew, or by the exercise of reasonable care could have discovered, *370her perilous position and her incapacity to escape from it before she was struck by his automobile, that the defendant had the time ■and means to avoid injury to her by the exercise of reasonable care after he discovered, or should have discovered, her dangerous position and her incapacity to escape therefrom, but negligently failed to use the available time and means to avoid striking her with his automobile, and for that reason struck and injured her. Wade v. Sausage Co., 239 N.C. 524, 80 S.E. 2d 150.
I vote to reverse the judgment of nonsuit entered below.