Court Opinion

ID: 9545958
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:22:41.434172+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:15:49.210023
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice PARKER,
dissenting.
The majority opinion would seem to rest principally on the following statement contained therein, “The mere fact, standing alone, that the vehicle hit the child inside an open courtyard without the driver realizing the child was present in the courtyard is sufficient to' question the driver’s insistence that she was looking to the rear and right rear as she backed,” a pronouncement for which no legal authority is cited. Moreover, the testimony fails to show that the courtyard was open. The record discloses no substantial evidence of negligence which would justify the submission of this cause to the jury.
We have previously held:
“When it clearly appears to the trial court that upon the evidence produced, giving to it its full probative force, together with all reasonable inferences deducible therefrom, it fails to establish in law a claim, * * * it is not only the right but the duty of the court to so instruct the jury. * * * ” Calkins v. Wyoming Coal Mining Co., 25 Wyo. 409,171 P. 265, 267.
Here the plaintiff was entitled to every reasonable or legitimate inference which might be drawn from the evidence, but an inference of negligence may not be based upon mere surmise, conjecture, guess, speculation, or probability. O’Keefe v. Cheyenne Chamber of Commerce, 56 Wyo. 170, 105 P.2d 279; Galicich v. Oregon Short Line R. Co., 54 Wyo. 123, 87 P.2d 27.
I would affirm.