Court Opinion

ID: 9619825
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 05:33:50.647903+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:46:16.090599
License: Public Domain

VAN DYKE, P. J.
I dissent. The errors complained of are, misdirection of the jury and improper rejection of evidence. For such errors we are commanded by the Constitution not to reverse the judgment unless, after an examination of the entire cause, including the evidence, we shall be of the opinion that the errors complained of have resulted in a miscarriage of justice. (Cal. Const., art. VI, §4½.)
The testimony of Doctor Wallace, which the court struck out, was upon matters admitted by the pleadings or at trial, except as to the bruising of the abdominal walls of the deceased child. It is claimed the existence of the bruises would sustain an inference they had been caused by the front of the child’s body being struck by the bumper of the milk truck. I agree it was material that plaintiffs should establish, if they could, that the child was fatally injured by being run over by the front tire instead of the rear tire for it affected the conclusion of negligence. The evidence directed to this point was entirely circumstantial. No witness saw the accident. The circumstantial evidence, other than that stricken, consisted of testimony of two witnesses who examined the front tire and found thereon a curly blond hair which matched the hair of the infant, and an abrasion upon the surface of the tire. From this evidence the jury certainly could have inferred that the front tire had struck and passed over the head of the infant, causing its death. Indeed it is difficult, assuming the truth of this testimony—and there was no con*16tradietory testimony—to explain the presence of the hair on the front tire except by inferring that it was that tire which caused death. The evidence excluded, which was likewise circumstantial, was not only cumulative but was most unsatisfactory. It could have no application unless the jury could reasonably infer from the existence of bruises upon the abdominal wall of the infant that these bruises were more probably caused by the bumper of the ear than by other means. No expert evidence was offered, and probably none could have been offered, that there was such greater probability. Granting, however, that the evidence could have been so evaluated, it must be said, in fairness, that such evaluation involves more of surmise and speculation than of rationalization, This evidence could have added little, if anything, to the much stronger evidence in the record upon the particular issue under discussion. In my opinion it had no material weight and I think further that the jury would have come to no other conclusion had it been admitted instead of being stricken.
The next error complained of was the giving of an instruction on contributory negligence which had been pleaded in defense and as to which much evidence had been introduced. The plaintiffs, contending that the driver of the truck had been negligent and that his negligence had been the sole proximate cause of the death of the infant, stood in this position: The mother of the child, which child was but two years old, had left the infant about 100 feet away from the point where the accident occurred. She had gone to the scene of the accident to talk with a neighbor woman who was standing close to where the milk truck had been stopped. While she was there the infant, in some unexplained way, wandered from the point where it had been left and went to the same vicinity where the mother had gone. As the truck was about to start the two women and two children began walking away. The mother had not seen the child follow her. The issue of contributory negligence, therefore, was as prominent in the case as was the issue of the driver’s negligence. It was, of course, proper that clear and full instructions should be given by the court concerning both issues. On the issue of contributory negligence the court instructed the jury as follows: That contributory negligence was negligence on the part of the “person injured” which had cooperated in some degree with the negligence of another and helped in proximately causing “the injury of which the former there*17after complains”; that the one who is guilty of contributory negligence could not recover from another “for the injury suffered”; that to establish the defense of contributory negligence the burden was upon the defendants to prove by a preponderance of evidence that plaintiffs were, or that either of them was, negligent and that such negligence contributed in some degree as a proximate cause of the death; that the action had been brought ly the parents of the deceased infant and that the defense of contributory negligence had been raised by the answer, thus presenting “an issue having to do with the conduct of the parents who are the plaintiffs in this action relative to their control over, instructions and warnings to, and discipline, care and supervision of, the child, or the absence of a reasonable measure of those factors ’ ’; that the question raised in this regard was, “Did the parents and each of them use ordinary care in the exercise of their parental duties, and if not, did the negligence of the parents or either of them in that respect contribute in any degree as a proximate cause of the death”; that “If the parents, or either of them, did not use ordinary care in the exercise of their parental duties” and if this neglect was a “proximate cause of the injury or death of the child of which they here complain, then the said parents may not recover in this action”; that a violation of law on the part of the driver was of no consequence unless it was a proximate cause “of an injury found ly you to have leen suffered ly the plaintiffs.” (Italics supplied.)
Now it is contended by the appellants and concurred in by the majority opinion that because once in the instructions contributory negligence was defined as negligence on the part of “a person injured” this may have been taken by the jury as referring to the infant child. The assumption is that the “person injured” may or could be taken as meaning the person injured physically, and not the person injured financially. This might ordinarily be the meaning, but the assumption cannot be made here. To my mind the assumption has validity only if we disregard a number of matters which ought not to be and in fact cannot be disregarded. There are the facts that this jury knew who the plaintiffs were; that they knew they were not asked to make an award to the child; and that they knew that nowhere in the record had there been any suggestion that the child had been or could have been, in view of its age, guilty of any negligence. This knowledge surely included knowledge that the reference in the instruction to *18the person injured was not to the child, but rather, as the instruction so plainly stated, was a reference to one who sought a recovery, that is, to the plaintiffs. Over and over the jury were told the issue of contributory negligence dealt with the conduct of the plaintiffs. I think that to consider this instruction, when read with the other instructions, as being error, or to conclude that it confused the jury, is wholly unjustifiable.
There is a third contention of error not treated in the majority opinion, but presented in the briefs, which has to do with a claim the trial court erred in giving an instruction, admittedly correct in form, on the subject of unavoidable accident. Little time need be spent in treating this claim of error. The record presented issues both of negligence and of proximate cause and in such cases it has been held proper to instruct the jury upon the subject of unavoidable accident. (Parker v. Womack, 37 Cal.2d 116, 120 [230 P.2d 823].)
There is an additional consideration which is that these same contentions of error were presented to the trial judge who heard the case. While this court is not bound by the order denying the motion for new trial, nevertheless the reaction of the trial judge to the motion and his ruling upon it is entitled to weight when the same issues are presented on appeal.
It is my conclusion that there was no error in the instructions and that the striking out of the evidence of the autopsy surgeon was a matter of little moment. This is a ease where, in my opinion, the constitutional provision amounts to a clear mandate to this court to affirm the judgment. I would do so.
A petition for a rehearing was denied May 26, 1954. Van Dyke, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted. Respondents’ petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied June 23, 1954. Edmonds, J., Schauer, J., and Spence, J., were of the opinion that the petition should be granted.