Court Opinion

ID: 9754425
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 20:00:13.98314+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:53.324335
License: Public Domain

Billings. C.J.,
concurring and dissenting. Although I concur with the majority that the trial court’s instructions to the jury were insufficient and erroneous, I must respectfully dissent from the majority’s affirmance of the denial of a directed verdict for the defendant. I would enter judgment for the, defendant.
To prevail in any negligence action, a plaintiff must prove that the party from which recovery is sought owed the plaintiff a duty of care, that the duty of care was breached, and that the breach proximately caused the plaintiff’s injuries. See Morris v. American Motors Corp., 142 Vt. 566, 572, 459 A.2d 968, 971 (1982).
Despite the majority’s disclaimer, one of the defendant’s main issues on appeal is the issue of the duty of care. The plaintiffs *168here have failed to prove that the State owed them a duty of care. There is no duty on the part of the State to regulate traffic on its highways. See, e.g., Department of Transportation v. Neilson, 419 So. 2d 1071, 1073 (Fla. 1982). An intersection with a traffic light which is emitting no signals is indistinguishable from an unregulated intersection. See Hoy v. Capelli, 48 N.J. 81, 87, 222 A.2d 649, 652 (1966) (intersection where signal removed because of malfunction indistinguishable from intersection never having signal). Thus, the State owed the plaintiffs here no duty to regulate the flow of traffic through the intersection where the accident here took place.
Cases from other jurisdictions where a duty of care is imposed by statute to keep highways free from dangerous conditions have necessarily been distinguished. See, e.g., Feingold v. County of Los Angeles, 254 Cal. App. 2d 622, 62 Cal. Rptr. 396 (1967); Lytle v. City of Newark, 166 N.J. Super. 191, 399 A.2d 333 (1979). The facts before us require treating this intersection as an unregulated one, and, therefore, are distinguished from the facts of other cases where a defective signal misregulates traffic. See, e.g., City of Indianapolis v. Parker, 427 N.E.2d 456, 460 (Ind. App. 1981) (traffic light signaling green in all directions); Baca v. Board of County Commissioners, 76 N.M. 88, 90, 412 P.2d 389, 390 (1966) (traffic signal signaling in only one direction).
In that there is no duty of care owed by the State to the plaintiffs under the circumstances of this case, the majority, by creating such a duty, is judicially legislating, which is improper, especially in view of the fact that no such duty is found in the common law.
I am authorized to state that Justice Peck joins in this dissent.