Court Opinion

ID: 9720205
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 08:20:22.147646+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:03:14.222113
License: Public Domain

HOMEYER, Judge
(dissenting).
No member of the court has been more critical of the guest statute than I. In my opinion it is a legal monstrosity. Nevertheless the legislature saw fit to enact it originally and then to retain it despite attempts to repeal it at nearly every legislative session during' the last decade. Consequently it is our duty as judges to apply the law not in accord with our personal feelings on the matter but as it has *367been written by the legislature and interpreted in prior decisions.
Starting with Melby v. Anderson (1936), 64 S.D. 249, 266 N.W. 135, and continuing through Minick v. Englert, 84 S.D. 73, 167 N.W.2d 551, this court has said the phrase “willful and wanton misconduct” used in the statute means something more than negligence. It means conduct from which it can be said the wrongdoer consciously realized that it would in all probability, as distinguished from possibility, produce the precise result which it did produce and bring harm to the plaintiff. In essence we have held it is the equivalent of culpable negligence. State v. Bates, 65 S.D. 105, 271 N.W. 765; Espeland v. Green, 74 S.D. 484, 54 N.W.2d 465.
In Chernotik v. Schrank, 76 S.D. 374, 79 N.W.2d 4, we said conduct which is wanton and wilful is more akin to an intentional tort than to negligence. There must be an element of deliberate recklessness. In Espeland, in reaffirming the principle of the guilty mind expressed in State v. Bates, supra, the court said “if we removed the essential of the guilty mind in guest cases as it is determined by the external standard of the reasonably prudent person, and as it exists in the wilful exposure of a defendant to a probability that harm will result, we would be destroying the line of demarcation between negligence cases and cases involving wilful and wanton misconduct.”
Separating the wheat from the chaff, these facts and circumstances appear. The defendant was unfamiliar with the road and had never traveled over it before. The plaintiff knew it well, having been over it many times and in fact, in daylight on the day of the accident. He knew of the signs, speed limit, and narrow bridge.
The detour for the first mile east was a graveled county highway, and the second mile south to where the accident happened, was a graveled township highway. It was a much used road. The main traveled part was at least 23 feet wide. There was no posted speed limit on the detour. The only speed limit sign was about 600 feet from the right curve sign, towards the bridge, and the numbers were partially obliterated. There was no speed limit shown on the right curve sign.
*368Defendant did not take this route going to Loomis and there can be little doubt the decision to travel this road to Mitchell resulted from plaintiff’s actions since he was the only one who knew about the road.
The speed estimates were not too far apart. Plaintiff said defendant was going 50 to 60 miles per hour as they entered the curve and defendant said it was from 40 to 50 miles per hour. Under either estimate it was not any great speed.
The so-called warnings were little more than ordinary conversation informing a driver of a temporary travel route. The first one during the first mile south of Loomis, consisted of the statement “they would have to slow down, there was a detour there and we’d have to turn”. The turn was made and they traveled east one mile and the defendant was driving satisfactorily. Certainly to this point there could be nothing which by any stretch of imagination could be considered wilful and wanton misconduct or even ordinary negligence.
They turned south; the bridge and accident scene were about SA mile from this turn. Approximately 14 mile north of the curve sign plaintiff said: “I stated there was a curve and that the bridge was at a bad angle in the road.” A little farther on before the curve sign he said, “you will have to slow down.” The curve sign showed a right curve. Later, “We were in the right hand curve, approaching the left hand curve when I said he would have to slow down”. About that time the car went off the shoulder. The car was then out of control.
The road curves gradually to the right for about 1000 feet from the curve sign and then turns sharply to the left at a point about 200 feet from the bridge. There was no left hand turn sign and it is undisputed plaintiff did not warn of any left hand curve or a speed limit sign.
Using plaintiff’s maximum speed estimate and applying it to the travel distance before the defendant lost control of the car, the time span of the warnings and failure to heed on which the majority largely relies to establish wilful and wanton misconduct covers approximately 26 seconds.
*369Little significance should be attached to the red flag testimony. Quite obviously they were put up to mark the detour route and not as danger signs. The county highway superintendent said it was common or standard procedure to mark all detour routes with red flags. Most of the witnesses arriving at the scene of the accident did not even see them.
There is no evidence of intoxication. Drinking four cans of 3.2 beer over a 4-hour span and none during the last hour or so, would have little effect.
The record shows the right curve sign which defendant says misled him was replaced after the accident and a new speed limit sign was also put up.
The whole atmosphere preceding the accident seems to me to dispel deliberate recklessness. Here were three fraternity brothers driving to town for a hamburger. The plaintiff himself was drinking from a can of beer shortly before the accident and visiting. This does not indicate apprehension over the manner in which the car was being driven. Likewise, it does not constitute the “thrill ride” or “drag racing” atmosphere from which wilful and wanton misconduct has sometimes been inferred.
In Berlin v. Berens, 76 S.D. 429, 80 N.W.2d 79, we said if a verdict were permitted in that case we in effect would be obliterating “the difference between conduct that is negligent and misconduct which is willful and wanton”. It appears to me this is what the majority has done in this case. As we said in Mitzel v. Hauck, 78 S.D. 543, 105 N.W.2d 378: “'The standard has been fixed by the legislature and courts are bound by it.”
I see little similarity between the factual situation here and in Minick v. Englert, supra. In Minick the defendant was an engineer in charge of the construction where the accident occurred. The bridge was out and the road barricaded. He drove through the barricade and into the excavation. We said:
“It appears from the facts and circumstances of this case that defendant entered into an area of dan*370ger without heeding warning signs and a barricade across the highway of which he had actual knowledge. There was no obstruction or impairment of visibility and no reasonable excuse for defendant’s failure to see the signs and the approaching hazard. Defendant concedes that it was his responsibility as an engineer and employee of the state to require contractors on the project to provide and maintain necessary detours and to erect and maintain signs to warn travelers of unsafe places on the highway under construction and that he had actual knowledge of the detour and the warning signs which had been so provided by contractors.” (Italics mine)
The foundation for the Minick decision was actual knowledge of the danger and a deliberate disregard of danger by one possessing such knowledge. I might add the recitation of facts in that case treated the defendant’s misconduct charitably.
The accident itself might be termed a freak accident. Although defendant may have been negligent in driving too fast under the circumstances and momentarily lost control of the car on a soft shoulder he nearly regained control and averted the accident. The car was almost stopped and except for the protruding angle iron, there perhaps would have been no injury, or no serious injury, and minimal damage to the car. Defendant and the other guest passenger were not injured. Compare this with fact situations in Wentzel v. Huebner, 78 S.D. 481, 104 N.W.2d 695, and Minick v. Englert, supra, where verdicts in guest cases were sustained.
RENTTO, J., concurs in dissent.