Court Opinion

ID: 9617719
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 05:00:27.73321+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:04:15.317707
License: Public Domain

HENRIOD, Justice
(dissenting).
I agree with that portion of the main opinion that condemns the instructions mentioned. I think, however, that we should not have reached the stage where we send the case back for a new trial for faulty instructions, but that we should have reversed it with directions to dismiss plaintiff’s complaint on grounds of contributory negligence as a matter of law. Hence, I dissent.
The main opinion mollifies the facts in this case by analyzing rules of law applied to facts not germane here, and by interspersing hypothetical conclusions the jury might have arrived at, — had the facts been different than admittedly were extant here.
The main opinion seems to concede that plaintiff was in the driveway, but guesses that she may have been on a portion thereof not ordinarily travelled by vehicles. Aside from this writer’s difficulty in determining on which portion of a driveway a car owner must drive, — the south, north, east, west or middle, — in order to exculpate himself, plaintiff’s counsel himself disagrees with the opinion’s fine distinction which suggests that one may be free of negligence by being on one part of a driveway built apparently for plenary occupation by vehicles, but not if he is on another part of the same driveway. Plaintiff’s counsel insists that the plaintiff was not in the driveway at all, but that “she was standing on the shoulder which was not ordinarily used for vehicular travel.” So says his brief.
Counsel for plaintiff makes such assertion on the basis that the jury, on conflicting evidence, is the agency to resolve the facts one way or the other, and that once established, the evidence will be reviewed in a light most favorable to respondent. He makes no contention that had the jury found plaintiff was struck in the driveway she could have reco'vered nonetheless.
The principles enunciated have to do with cases of conflict in the evidence created by contradictions between that adduced by one side as opposed to the other, but not where the conflict has been created solely by the party that seeks to take advantage of the rule that conflicts in the evidence shall be resolved in favor of the winner.
In this case the conflict as to where plaintiff was struck, was created by the plaintiff herself, she being the only witness attesting thereto. She is bound by a well-established principle that one’s testimony is no stronger than that he gives on cross-examination.1 It is incumbent on this court, therefore, to review her testimony *15under cross-examination, which among other things, was as follows:
“I followed the sidewalk and then walked down the south side of the driveway. I was on the driveway when I was hit and it was the south side of the driveway.”
She also testified as follows:
“Q. And so you had walked down the driveway for some distance, is that right? A. Yes.
“Q. And during the time that you walked down toward the travel portion of the street your back was to the ■door of the garage, that’s true, isn’t it? A. Yes, it is true.
“Q. And having walked up near this garage is there any place there where it would have been safer for you to have gone out through the street than the route on the driveway which you took? A. Well, everybody walks across there.
“Q. Supposing instead of walking down the driveway as you did, suppose you had walked in this area say just two or three or four feet to the south of where you walked out to the curb that way. Could you have done that? A. That is completely level all along there.
“Q. Well, Could you have done that? A. Yes, I could.
“Q. In other words you could have walked along that dirt area to the curb rather than walking down the driveway if you had wanted to, is that correct? A. Yes.
“Q. At the time and the place he was on the drive you were on the driveway? A. Yes.
“Q. Is the reason you walked down the driveway rather than walking to the curb because you did not want to step off the curb, is that not correct, Mrs. Ivie? A. No, I did not have any reason. * * *
“Q. And from the time you left the sidewalk and started down the driveway, during all that period of time your back was to the doorway of the garage, is that correct? A. Yes.”
On re-direct examination, plaintiff chose to depart from such testimony, saying she was not in the driveway but was standing south and on the shoulder of the driveway.
In what appears to be a rather labored effort to render lip service to the rule that one’s testimony is no stronger than that given on cross-examination, but in what I think is an equally labored effort to circumvent it by a type of peripatetics quite inapplicable to the facts of this case, and by way of generalization that may not only haunt us later but which would emasculate the rule mentioned, the main opinion says:
“The rule is correct, but its attempted application here is not. Like all *16rules, it must be applied with due consideration for the situation at hand. It does not preclude a witness who may have been confused or mistaken from either clarifying his testimony or rectifying errors on redirect. Such is the purpose of redirect examination. Even if a witness had testified one way as to a given fact, that would not preclude him from testifying otherwise if the matter were again called to his attention. One might even have testified falsely and later recant and tell the truth. In such instance testifying two ways on a given situation may discredit the witness so the jury would not believe him; or they may believe the testimony against his interest. But it would be for the jury to decide as to the credibility of the witness and the version of his testimony, if any, they would accept.”
In this case the plaintiff was not “confused or mistaken,”' — until, after cross-examination and on redirect examination she reversed herself completely and got herself out of the driveway where, so situate, her cause would have been damaged or lost altogether. Her testimony on cross-examination, set out above, showed no confusion or mistakenness, and the quoted remarks of the main opinion, attributes to her a role of a witness quite out of character with that here. The purpose of redirect examination may be to clarify confusion, but its function was never to fabricate evidence or change unconfused, clear testimony elicited on cross-examination.
When the main opinion says “Even if a witness had testified one way as to a given fact, that would not preclude him from testifying otherwise if the matter were called to his attention,” such statement may be true. But if he does testify one way on cross-examination and he testifies otherwise on direct' or redirect examination, it has been my impression that the veniremen could not weigh the contradictions, but must be told, under the Alvarado case, one written by Chief Justice Crockett, the author here, that they must consider only that testimony given on cross-examination.
The main opinion continues that “one might even have testified falsely and later recant and tell the truth.” That is not this case at all. Plaintiff here admitted to no falsehood. Had she done so the verdict almost surely would have been other than it was.
It is further said in the main opinion that “testifying two ways on a given situation may discredit the witness so the jury would not believe him; or it may believe the testimony against his interest. But it would be for the jury to decide as to the credibility of the witness and the version of his testimony, if any, they would accept.” This statement would seem to destroy entirely the rule laid- down in the Alvarado case, since it says that the jury may weigh *17the diametrically opposed testimony given on direct and cross-examination. If we say the jury may weigh both and choose which it likes, we must be logical and say that on appeal we are bound to accept the verdict based on such inconsistent testimony. It places a premium on prevarication once one is confronted with testimony he gives on cross-examination that proves harmful to his cause. Such statement of the main opinion hardly can be squared with the following language of the Alvarado case:
“The rule is familiar that ‘testimony of a witness on his direct examination is no stronger than as modified or left by his further examination or by his cross-examination. A particular part of his testimony may not be singled out to the exclusion of other parts of equal importance bearing on the subject.’ Putnam v. Industrial Comm., 80 Utah 187, 14 P.2d 973, 981.” [2 Utah 2d 16, 268 P.2d 987.]
There is no escape from the fact that either we were wrong in the Alvarado and Futnam cases or we are wrong in the instant case.
It appears from plaintiff’s own testimony that she had in mind going home by a route not marked for pedestrians, that she walked down a driveway obviously designed for vehicular travel, and that at no time after she entered the driveway did she make any effort to observe any vehicular movement from the garage.
Under such circumstances, where plaintiff employed a route obviously designed for vehicular, not pedestrian travel, without glancing back to determine if there were any vehicular movement from the rear, there should be no choice but to conclude under established principles that she was contributorily negligent as a matter of law.2
The case should be reversed and dismissed.

. Alvarado v. Tucker, 1954, 2 Utah 2d 16, 268 P.2d 986.

. Johnson v. Syme, 1957, 6 Utah 2d 319, 313 P.2d 468, and cases cited therein.