Court Opinion

ID: 9885536
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-10-06 13:07:05.698708+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:48:53.541700
License: Public Domain

Feoessel, J.
(dissenting). We dissent and vote to affirm the judgments of the Appellate Division, upon the ground that the State Avas concurrently negligent Avitk Miss Steinmiller, and that *509the absence of the “ stop ” sign, referred to in the prevailing opinion, was a proximate cause of these unfortunate accidents. Said sign was erected pursuant to the January, 1949, orders of the New York State Traffic Commission. It was maintained until September, 1951, when struck down by an automobile. Although the State Highway Department was notified the same day, it failed to re-erect or repair said sign. Such failure clearly amounted to negligence on the part of the State.
The Court of Claims found that Miss Steinmiller “ had never driven along Fisk Road toward Route 96-A in that direction prior to this occasion ”. She stated three times that she did not slow down until she saw she was entering Route 96A. She was then but 20 feet westerly therefrom. She did not come to a stop prior to reaching into Route 96A, when she saw the Greyhound bus approaching from her right. She was not sure whether she applied her brakes, nor whether she was at a standstill at the time when her car was 1% feet out into Route 96A and when she was hit by the McGuire car approaching from her left. Under these circumstances, it is crystal clear that Miss Steinmiller did not have, in the language of the majority, “ all the warning, all the notice of danger, that a stop sign would have afforded ”.
In the prevailing opinion it is said ‘ ‘ there is not the slightest basis ” for inferring that, had the sign been in place, Miss Steinmiller would have stopped before proceeding a foot and a half into the intersection, and that the purpose of a stop sign is simply to require a vehicle to “ ‘ pause at a point where visibility is adequate to assure safety in undertaking the crossing.’ ” The law is clearly otherwise. Section 95-d of the Vehicle and Traffic Law provides, so far as pertinent:
“ It shall be unlawful for the driver of any vehicle to enter upon or cross a state highway from an intersecting road or highway upon which such a stop sign is erected without first having brought the vehicle to a full stop at or close to the intersection of such state highway. A person having stopped as directed by such a stop sign shall proceed with caution so as not to interfere with or endanger traffic. A sign bearing the word ‘ stop ’, with or without explanatory words, shall be sufficient under this section to require a full stop.
*510“ Any person failing to obey any provision of this section or any sign, signal or marking established pursuant to this section shall be deemed guilty of violating this section and upon conviction shall be subject to the penalties [elsewhere provided].” (Emphasis supplied.)
Section 95-d also provides that such sign “ shall be plainly visible at all times for a distance of at least fifty feet ”. Since the location of the old sign was 36 feet from the intersection, Miss Steinmiller would have had adequate warning of this dangerous intersection, had the sign been in place, when she was at least 86 feet from Eoute 96A. She would then hayq,known it was necessary for her to come “ to a full stop at or close to the intersection ”, and that to have entered upon Eoute 96A without stopping would have been a violation of law.
The majority agree that had “ the stop sign been in place, we presume that Miss Steinmiller would have observed its injunction. But that is precisely what she did do ”. The facts are indisputably otherwise. She simply did not obey the mandate of the law, to wit, to bring her “ vehicle to a full stop at or close to the intersection ”. She went beyond it, and, because of this violation, the accident happened, and two lives were snuffed out. Thus the absence of the sign was the most proximate cause of this accident.
In the light of her testimony, the Court of Claims had no right to assume that she would not have obeyed the law, but it was undoubtedly influenced by the thought it expressed that “ the courts have gone a long way on inferring ”. Courts do not presume, either in civil or criminal cases, that people deliberately disobey the law when they are adequately cautioned. Such was the rationale behind our decisions in Murphy v. De Revere (304 N. Y. 922 [stop sign]); Eastman v. State of New York (303 N. Y. 691 [stop sign]); Nuss v. State of New York (301 N. Y. 768 [stop sign]); Foley v. State of New York (294 N. Y. 275 [traffic signal]); Barna v. State of New York (293 N. Y. 877 [warning sign]); Van de Walker v. State of New York (278 N. Y. 454 [warning sign]).
In those cases we held that the absence of an appropriate “ stop ” or warning sign constituted negligence on the part of the State or other governmental agency, and was a proximate cause of the accident that happened in each case. Such is the *511situation here, where the evidence was clear that the State negligently failed to maintain the sign in question, and that Miss Steinmiller, in the absence of such warning sign on this first occasion that she traveled this way, had approached the intersection, without coming “ to a full stop at or close to the intersection ’ ’; the only reasonable inference which could be drawn was that the State’s negligence was a proximate cause of the accident.
The Appellate Division properly applied the law, and its determination of the facts was supported by the overwhelming-weight of the evidence. The judgments appealed from should be affirmed, with costs.
Desmond, Dye, Van Voorhis and Burke, JJ., concur with Fuld, J.; Frobssel, J., dissents in an opinion in which Conway, Oh. J., concurs.
Judgments reversed, etc.