Court Opinion

ID: 9448658
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 23:42:25.453555+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:31:31.339415
License: Public Domain

LEONARD P. MOORE, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
Although I agree with the conclusion that there should be a new trial, I cannot accept what I regard as certain factual inaccuracies and erroneous legal principles in Judge Waterman’s opinion. To say that from the evidence the jury could have concluded that the Socinski car “attempted to squeeze between the two [i. e., defendant’s parked car and the truck]” is in direct conflict with the opin*339ion’s assumption that the collision occurred “Twenty to twenty-five feet before Soeinski’s car would have come abreast of the defendant’s parked car.”
Nor can I find from the conceded facts any justification for submitting to the jury “defendant’s leaving the scene rather hurriedly without talking to anyone as evidence of a consciousness of liability.” The cases cited that flight from the scene of an accident tends to prove the party fleeing believes that he is responsible for the mishap are completely inapposite here. They are mostly of the hit-and-run type. Here the facts as produced by plaintiff establish that defendant was on the porch of the tourist home when he heard the crash. He turned, saw the vehicles and noted that the drivers were arguing. Instead of dashing for his car and driving away, he entered the tourist home, emerged about ten minutes later, noted the cars still there and then drove off. A witness thought that he walked to his car rather hurriedly. The trial court stressed defendant’s failure to talk to anyone at the scene of the accident as a factor in showing consciousness of liability on his part. Surely it cannot be contended that defendant should have-accosted both drivers and cross-examined them as to why they collided or that he should have vocally registered a public protestation that his parked ear was in no way responsible for the accident. In my opinion the court’s charge on this subject cannot be supported as a matter of law.
Upon any new trial, the problem relating to Officer Paige’s report will again arise. He did not see the accident. The statements of each driver were hearsay and the Officer’s conclusions as to the cause of the accident were inadmissible under fundamental principles of evidence. The trial court properly ruled that the officers “could not state that in their opinion Sharif was to blame for the accident.” His exclusion of page 3 of the Accident Report was proper because the question of Sharif’s parking as contributing to the accident was “for the Jury, and not for Officer Paige to determine.” (Tinney v. Crosby, 112 Vt. 95, 100, 22 A.2d 145, 147; Landry v. Hubert, 100 Vt. 268, 275, 137 A. 97, 100; Desmarchier v. Frost, 91 Vt. 138, 143, 99 A. 782, 783.)