Court Opinion

ID: 9852988
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:40:41.940993+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:39.131696
License: Public Domain

Beasley, Judge,
dissenting.
I agree that defendant was not entitled to a directed verdict or judgment n.o.v., as held in Division 2, but it is entitled to a new trial in which the jury is permitted to consider the defense of sudden emergency, contrary to the holding in Division 1.
Two of plaintiff’s witnesses saw the incident occur. They were bystanders, sitting on the second-story deck of the restaurant in front of which plaintiff collided with the pole bearing the restaurant sign. Both testified that a white pickup truck which was to the left of the bus and partially ahead of it suddenly turned to the right, cutting off the forward movement of the bus. The bus driver reacted by moving the bus to the right, which caused plaintiff, in a 1992 Honda Accord traveling next to the bus, to also turn to the right to avoid the bus. He hit his brakes, skidded, and hit the pole.
Witness Davis testified that the truck “cut off the bus and the bus reacted by swerving, eventually into . . . the far right lane. . . . [The truck] was almost past [the bus] when it moved over, but it wasn’t quite. All I know is that if the bus had not reacted, the truck would have struck the bus if the bus did not react.” When asked whether he observed any reason the bus driver did not slow for the truck and let it into the center lane, the witness responded: “Well, first of all, the truck, it didn’t — it looked like the truck just all of a sudden said, Whoa. I got to get over, and I am going to do this. I don’t remember seeing blinkers or anything. I just remember that it just immediately took a bolt into the next lane, you know.”
Witness Woodall, who had been idly watching the vehicles come up the street, saw the truck come into the bus driver’s lane and the bus move into the curb lane as a result. The front of plaintiff’s car was about midway the length of the bus. When the truck cut in front of the bus, it appeared that the bus driver “just turned the wheel to get over from hitting the truck and going into the other lane.” The truck had not cleared the bus when it turned into the center lane, “[s]o when the truck came over, the bus went over.” Part of the truck was still beside the bus when “the truck darted in front of the bus.” When asked what would have happened if the bus had not moved to the right, witness Woodall stated: “The bus would have ate the truck if he wouldn’t have moved. Excuse my slang.” He explained: “If the bus wouldn’t have come over, the bus would have collided with the truck. There would have been no way. The only way he could have stopped it was either slowing down or moving out of its way, and he *268moved out of its way instead of slowing down.” All of this happened very quickly. He told the officer on the scene that the “white pickup truck ran MARTA bus over into plaintiff’s lane.”
These two witnesses had a clear view of the occurrence. Plaintiff himself testified that he noticed the white truck “trying to be fast going in and out in between [vehicles] . . . and . . . just switching the lanes” as the traffic moved up the street. The driver appeared to be trying to get in front of everybody and seemed to be in a hurry. Plaintiff was beside the rear of the bus, when the bus “jumped” into his lane, without using turn signal or horn, and stayed in that lane as it moved up the street. It did not hit plaintiff’s car. Plaintiff could not see the truck when it was on the other side of the bus so he did not observe its movement, although he agreed that when the case was first filed, he alleged that “the pickup truck immediately to the left of the MARTA bus suddenly and without warning came into the lane of the MARTA bus.” He explained that he was not 100 percent sure how it happened, but he guessed that is what occurred because he saw the truck and saw it zigzagging, “and my understanding maybe that truck pulled on the side of him and forcing, but how it happened, how the transaction, whatever the thing happened, I don’t have any clue.” When the bus moved into his lane, he shifted the clutch and put on the brake and the hand brake and hit the pole.
The majority concludes that MARTA was not entitled to a charge on sudden emergency because it disclaimed any involvement in the accident, in that it called the seven drivers who drove buses that afternoon on that route and had each of them affirmatively deny that any white truck suddenly pulled into their lane. The record shows that the MARTA bus drivers did not give such testimony. Rather, they testified that they did not recall such an incident. None was aware of it. One of the drivers did testify that he saw the wrecked car against the pole when traveling in the opposite direction later, going into Atlanta. This driver also testified that when driving the bus, there is a blind spot behind it. Thus, MARTA did not deny that the incident took place. In fact, it relies on the testimony of bystanders with respect to how it occurred.
Thus there was direct physical evidence in the form of what the eyewitnesses saw occur, which supported the theory that the bus driver was faced with a sudden emergency created by the driver of the pickup truck, and there was no evidence to contradict it. This evidence also provided a reason for the bus driver’s action. Of course, whether the action taken was negligent or not is a jury question, but the law does not require the actor himself to testify that he was confronted with a sudden emergency. A sudden emergency “ ‘may properly be defined as any event or combination of circumstances which call for immediate action without giving time for the deliberate exer*269cise of judgment or discretion, in short, an exigency.’ ” (Citation omitted.) Ware v. Alston, 112 Ga. App. 627, 629 (145 SE2d 721) (1965). See also Luke v. Spicer, 194 Ga. App. 183, 184 (3) (390 SE2d 267) (1990). There is no reason that proof of the event or combination of circumstances which creates the emergency cannot be established by the testimony of observers. What was seen in the instant case to occur is evidence that a sudden emergency was presented to the bus driver by the veering of the truck into the bus driver’s lane, that the bus driver realized that the truck would hit the bus if some evasive action was not taken, and that he chose to move the bus away from the advancing truck into the next lane, which was empty adjacent to the front of the bus. There is no evidence that the bus driver knew, or should have known, that plaintiff was at the rear of the bus when the bus driver moved the bus to avoid a collision with the truck. The bystanders watched the situation develop, watched the emergency materialize, and observed what the bus driver did to avert it. I do not agree with the majority that “there is no evidence the MAKTA driver, while driving without negligence, perceived that he was faced with a sudden emergency and exercised an unplanned choice in the matter.”
Indeed, the actor may be killed in the incident brought about by the sudden emergency, or may suffer loss of memory due to injuries sustained, or may die following the incident but prior to trial. This handicap does not preclude the establishment of the existence of a sudden emergency. The physical factors are what establish it, and others who witness it can testify that it existed. The persuasiveness of their testimony depends on their vantage point, attention, and clarity of vision, as well as upon the strength of recollection and honesty which is common to all witnesses. Pollard v. Weeks, 60 Ga. App. 664, 672-673 (1) (4 SE2d 722) (1939), is a case in which sudden emergency was deemed provable by evidence other than by the person who was faced with it, acted, and was killed. As the Court reasoned, the plaintiff’s decedent “was called on to act quickly under circumstances which might reasonably be found by a jury to constitute an emergency, a situation caused by the alleged negligence of the defendant. Whether or not, in the manner he responded, he was entirely free from negligence or could have avoided the consequences of the extraordinary risk which the jury would be authorized to find was present, and whether or not he was guilty of any contributory negligence, are questions for the jury.” Id. at 673.
Bryant v. Ga. R. &c. Co., 162 Ga. 511 (134 SE 319) (1926), is another case in which sudden emergency was shown by the testimony of eyewitnesses and not by testimony of the person who was faced with it. In that instance, too, the latter was killed, and the suit was brought by his widow.
The court in Mehretab’s case charged the jury on the defense of *270sudden emergency but, after discussion following plaintiff’s objection to it, recharged the jury to eliminate consideration of this doctrine. The court explained that it was inapplicable because there was no testimony from the driver, and the driver himself or herself had to testify that the action taken was upon realization of peril. The withdrawal of this defense was material to the jury’s deliberation, as demonstrated by its request for clarity on the definition of sudden emergency before the court withdrew the charge.
Decided January 16, 1997
David R. Autry, for appellant.
Andrew W. Estes, E. Graydon Shuford, for appellee.
Circumstantial evidence of motive and intent is frequently admitted, when that is an issue. See Unden v. State, 218 Ga. App. 463, 465 (2) (462 SE2d 408) (1995). Although there is no direct evidence as to why the bus driver did not brake, there is evidence to explain why the bus driver moved the bus into the right lane. Even plaintiff used the word “forcing” in referring to the movement of the truck in relation to the forward moving bus.
The act of a third party may cause “a sudden emergency which forces a driver to choose one of two courses of conduct, either of which would, in the absence of such emergency, constitute negligence or a violation of a statute, but which, because of the emergency, becomes necessary either in self-defense or to avoid a greater injury than that which in fact resulted.” Cruse v. Taylor, 89 Ga. App. 611, 617 (2) (80 SE2d 704) (1954).
The majority also concludes that the testimony of the eyewitnesses to the accident would not support a charge on sudden emergency, because their testimony is “perfectly consistent” with either of two possibilities: (1) that a bus driver faced the emergency the witnesses perceived and acted as these witnesses believed, or (2) that the bus driver involved was unaware of any emergency and negligently caused Mehretab to hit the sign. While the eyewitnesses’ testimony technically does not exclude the second possibility, a jury could find that it preponderates toward the first. To hold that such testimony does not warrant a charge on sudden emergency is to embrace the very proposition which the majority purports to reject, i.e., that a jury charge on sudden emergency does not require testimony from the person who may have faced a sudden peril.
I am authorized to state that Chief Judge Andrews and Presiding Judge Pope join in this dissent.