Court Opinion

ID: 9684098
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 13:46:38.29239+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:52.755130
License: Public Domain

DONNELLY, Justice,
dissenting.
The four-year-old plaintiff was walking across the parking lot behind her apartment when struck by another child on a bicycle. The parking lot behind plaintiff’s apartment is situated at the base of a steep driveway which neighborhood children use as a bicycle path. Plaintiff’s expert testified that, based on the assumption that plaintiff flew 10-15 feet in the air after being struck and traveled 20 feet altogether from the point of impact, the bicycle which struck plaintiff was traveling a minimum speed of 16.4 miles per hour. Plaintiff’s expert further testified that a bicycle could not have traveled over two strategically placed speed bumps at speeds in excess of ten miles per hour and that, so long as the bicycle rider traveled over the second speed bump at no more than three to four miles per hour, he would be unable to attain a speed in excess of eleven miles per hour at the point where plaintiff was struck. It was plaintiff’s theory at trial that defendants were negligent in failing to make the parking lot safe by installing speed bumps. Following a jury award for plaintiff in the amount of $850,000, the trial court entered judgment for defendants notwithstanding the verdict.
The issue here is one of allocation of loss.
“The mere fact that injury follows negligence does not necessarily create liability. A causal connection must be established between the negligence charged or submitted and the loss or injury sustained, such that the injury would not have happened but for the negligence, and also that the negligence was not only a cause but was a proximate cause.” Branstetter v. Gerdeman, 364 Mo. 1230, 1237, 274 S.W.2d 240, 245 (1955) (emphasis supplied). The “but for” or “sine qua non” rule of causation may be stated as follows: “The defendant’s conduct is a cause of the event if the event would not have occurred but for that conduct; conversely, the defendant’s conduct is not a cause of the event, if the event would have occurred without it.” Prosser & Keeton on Torts 266 (5th ed. 1984).
In the present case the jury would be required to speculate to make a determination that defendants’ alleged negligence as submitted — the failure to install speed *671bumps — was a cause of plaintiffs injury. The evidence does not support the inference that plaintiff’s injuries would not have occurred but for the lack of speed bumps. There is no evidence as to how much the speed bumps would have had to slow the bicycle in order for the rider to have avoided plaintiff’s injuries. Absent such evidence, the jury could not, as the principal opinion asserts, “properly find that a speed bump would have slowed the cyclist, making it more likely that he would have heard a warning or would have seen the plaintiff in time to avoid the collision.” Cf. Bass v. Bi-State Development Agency, 661 S.W.2d 609 (Mo.App.1983).
Nor is recovery justified in this case by operation of the so-called “substantial factor” test of causation. The “substantial factor” test was developed as a framework for analysis for the relatively infrequent situation in which two causes concur to bring about an event and either one of them, operating alone, would have been sufficient to cause the plaintiff’s injury. Prosser & Keeton on Torts, 268 (5th ed. 1984). Where, as here, the alleged negligence of the defendant (in failing to install speed bumps) could not, operating alone, have caused plaintiff’s injury, causation may be determined in accordance with the traditional rules of “but for” and “proximate” causation without resort to “substantial factor” analysis. Id. Even under “substantial factor” analysis the defendant’s negligent conduct “is not a substantial factor in bringing about harm to another if the harm would have been sustained even if the actor had not been negligent.” Restatement (Second) of Torts, § 432(1) (1965).
In short, plaintiff may not recover under the traditional analyses made in terms of causation. Nevertheless, the majority, in a case involving alleged nonfeasance, demonstrates minimal, if any, concern for fault and neuters the much-used concept that it is the duty of a trial court to direct a verdict for the defendant where causation is a matter of pure speculation and conjecture. More important, it renders irrelevant the question “whether the defendant should be legally responsible for the injury.” Prosser & Keeton on Torts 273 (5th ed. 1984). I recognize that attempts to deal with the question in terms of causation have “led and can lead * * * to utter confusion.” Id. The majority opines: “Striving for certainty is a tour de force. The jury must deal in terms of probabilities. * * * One purpose of the law of torts is to encourage people to take precautions.” The question remains untouched.
“It is sometimes said that compensation for losses is the primary function of tort law and the primary factor influencing its development. It is perhaps more accurate to describe the primary function as one of determining when compensation is to be required. Courts leave a loss where it is unless they find good reason to shift it. A recognized need for compensation is, however, a powerful factor influencing tort law. Even though, like other factors, it is not alone decisive, it nevertheless lends weight and cogency to an argument for liability that is supported also by an array of other factors.” Prosser & Keeton on Torts 20 (5th ed. 1984).
It must be obvious to those who care that the majority is bent on making the need for compensation the overwhelming function of the law of torts in Missouri. See e.g., Virginia D. v. Madesco Investment Corp., 648 S.W.2d 881 (Mo. banc 1983); Elmore v. Owens-Illinois, Inc., 673 S.W.2d 434 (Mo. banc 1984); Fowler v. Park Corp., 673 S.W.2d 749 (Mo. banc 1984); and Nesselrode v. Executive Beechcraft, Inc., 707 S.W.2d 371 (Mo. banc 1986).
I must again respectfully dissent. “The tendency of principle and rule to conform to moral standards, which is a true avenue of growth for law, is not to be confounded with the suspension of all principle and rule and the substitution of sentiment or unregulated benevolence, which, pushed to an extreme, is the negation of all law.” B. Cardozo, The Paradoxes of Legal Science (1928).
In my view, “where persons contribute to cause an occurrence, and damage is suf*672fered, each should bear responsibility only in proportion to his fault.” Steinman v. Strobel, 589 S.W.2d 293, 296 (Mo. banc 1979) (Donnelly, J., dissenting). My brothers have every right to disagree: “What one judge most earnestly believes to be the right method is met by the challenge of men as able and conscientious who say it is the wrong one.” B. Cardozo, The Growth of the Law (1924). However, they should not excise the question of legal responsibility from the law of torts.