Court Opinion

ID: 9707727
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 02:20:03.205938+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:37.190908
License: Public Domain

Howard, D.J., Retired,
dissenting.
The question is whether there is fit evidence of an unusual circumstance which, if believed by a jury, would exempt plaintiff from the rigors of Petersen v. Schneider, 153 Neb. 815, 46 N.W.2d 355 (1951), modified 154 Neb. 303, 47 N.W.2d 863, which bars the left-turner’s recovery when he fails to look at a time when it would be effective to do so or negligently fails to see that which is in plain sight. I respectfully dissent because in my view, the majority opinion supplies the glaring deficiency in such evidence of an unusual circumstance with the same speculation it would deny to a jury!
The opinion elevates plaintiff’s failure to see defendant’s passing car until he turns into it to the status of evidence that *191defendant’s car was concealed. That may be a proper inference for the time that defendant’s car was wholly out of the passing lane. But there is nothing unusual about that. The leap into speculation is the unstated but necessary premise of the opinion that defendant’s vehicle was hidden from view as plaintiff began his turn and at the same time was approaching at a high rate of speed so as to disable the effectiveness of plaintiff’s lookout, if any. Two elements are necessary to construct this scenario: first, that defendant’s vehicle was close behind the pickup, and second, that it suddenly pulled out at a high rate of speed. There was no evidence whatever that defendant lurked close behind the pickup. The only evidence is that in normal fashion, defendant moved into the passing lane, as did the brown car in passing. Nor is there any evidence of excessive speed on the paved road carrying a 55-mile-per-hour speed limit. And, of course, the two elements of suddenly pulling out from close behind the pickup and attaining excessive speed are contradictory.
The majority opinion ignores the fact that when defendant’s vehicle moved into the passing lane in normal fashion, it was in plain sight. Plaintiff never saw defendant’s vehicle until he struck its right front corner with the left front corner of his own vehicle. Had he looked before making the turn, he would have seen the car attempting to pass. As plaintiff stated, the car “seemed to come from nowhere.” But it did not come from nowhere; it came in the normal passing situation, for all that the actual evidence shows, not in a train of unusual circumstances. Assuming any negligence on the part of defendant, the trial judge, in fashioning instructions, will now have the unenviable task of reconciling the facts of the case with the speculation bestowed upon him here.
Hastings, C.J., joins in this dissent.