Court Opinion

ID: 9739593
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 20:18:15.71439+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:13.111627
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE STOUDER, specially concurring: I agree with the result reached by my colleagues, but I doubt the applicability of some of the reasoning employed to support the result. In particular I do not believe that the “wrong side of the road rule” as discussed and applied in Sughero v. Jewel Tea Co. (1967), 37 Ill. 2d 240, 226 N.E.2d 28, can be applied to a rear-end collision. The Sughero case applies the rule as it is generally applied where one vehicle crosses into the lane legitimately occupied by a vehicle traveling in the opposite direction. This rule has not been applied, so far as I am aware, to a case such as this, where the collision occurred between vehicles traveling in the same direction in the lane properly used by vehicles traveling in that direction. However, I am content to agree with the holding that the defendant was negligent as a matter of law, but I believe such a conclusion is appropriate without resort to any burden of proof on his part arising from the application of the “wrong side of the road rule.”