Court Opinion

ID: 9854393
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:06:59.855515+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:23:03.656523
License: Public Domain

Benham, Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
Although I agree with the majority’s holding that the evidence was sufficient to convict appellant of a violation of OCGA § 40-6-40, and I concur in the affirmance of the conviction, I agree neither with the conclusion that the restitution ordered in this case was legal nor with the holding that the evidence of damages was admissible. For those reasons I dissent in part.
1. “The amount of restitution ordered may be equal to or less than, but not more than, the victim’s damages.” OCGA § 17-14-9. “ ‘Damages’ means all damages which a victim could recover against an offender in a civil action . . . based on the same act or acts for which the offender is sentenced. . . .” OCGA § 17-14-2 (2). The crucial language in the definition of damages is, “based on the same act . . . for which the offender is sentenced. ...” The only sentence imposed on appellant in this case was imposed for violating a statute requiring drivers to drive on the right half of the road. The testimony that appellant’s car crossed the centerline was the testimony which authorized the conviction. However, the evidence here also shows that she returned to her own side of the road before leaving the roadway and striking the signal post. Had that evidence shown that appellant continued across the centerline and struck something on the wrong side of the road, a different question might be presented. While the railroad may have a right to recover from appellant for the damage done to its signal post, the proximate cause of that damage was not that appellant’s car crossed the centerline of the road.
I agree completely with the majority’s finding that it may be inferred that appellant overcompensated after crossing the centerline, and that the overcompensation caused her car to veer off the roadway and into the signal post. However, appellant was not convicted of and sentenced for overcompensating, for veering off the roadway, for striking the signal post, or even for failing to maintain control of her vehicle. She was sentenced for crossing the centerline. While that may have been an act of negligence, it was not the act of negligence which proximately caused the damage to the railroad and for which the railroad could recover its damages from appellant. In our haste to ensure that the victim of appellant’s bad driving be recompensed, we must not lose sight of the mandate of the statute. The victim is entitled to such damages as it could recover from appellant for the act for which *668she was sentenced. She was sentenced for crossing the centerline of the road. If the railroad, in a suit to recover damages from appellant, proved no more than that she crossed the centerline of the road, it would not be entitled to damages. If it went on to prove that she then failed to maintain control of her vehicle and that her vehicle damaged railroad property while out of her control, it certainly would be entitled to recover damages from her. But, as I noted above, appellant was not sentenced for failing to maintain control of her vehicle, but for crossing the centerline. That act, the one for which she was sentenced, was not the proximate cause of the railroad’s damages, and the order of restitution was contrary to this State’s law and should be vacated.
2. The majority notes that the grounds upon which appellant objected to the admission of the evidence proffered by the State to establish damages were that it was irrelevant, that the original was not accounted for, and that it was hearsay. I find all three grounds meritorious.
First, because of my conviction that the imposition of a requirement of restitution was illegal, I am of the opinion that the evidence was irrelevant, there having been no showing that the railroad would be entitled to damages on the basis of appellant’s act of crossing the centerline of the road.
Second, the Code section on which the majority relies to excuse the State’s failure to account for the original of the document requires that the copy be made in the regular course of business. There was no testimony offered at trial to establish that the copy proffered as evidence was made in the regular course of business and no testimony was offered to account for the original. Having failed to meet the standard imposed by OCGA § 24-5-26, the State was not entitled to admission of its exhibit establishing the railroad’s damages. See State v. Mincey, 167 Ga. App. 850 (1) (308 SE2d 18) (1983).
Third, the State did not lay the foundation required by OCGA § 24-3-14 to overcome the hearsay nature of the document on which it relied to prove the railroad’s damages. Although the witness, an investigator, did testify that he was the custodian of the record, there was no evidence that the bill was made in the regular course of business or that it was the regular course of business to make the record at the time of the occurrence. The evidence offered by the State was that some unknown person submitted a form to the railroad’s accounting office and that someone there sent a copy of it to the witness. The bill was clearly hearsay and the State’s failure to make the showing required by the statute rendered the evidence inadmissible. Harris v. Collins, 149 Ga. App. 638 (4) (255 SE2d 107) (1979).
For all the reasons stated above, I concur in the affirmance of appellant’s conviction, but dissent to the affirmance of the imposition *669of restitution.
Decided March 18, 1988
Rehearing denied March 31, 1988
James A. Yancey, Jr., for appellant.
Douglas Gibson, Solicitor, for appellee.