Court Opinion

ID: 9856263
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:43:22.941019+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:38:31.165898
License: Public Domain

PariceR, J.,
dissenting as to defendant Williams. Plaintiff, -according to his testimony, was returning home from Columbia, South Gairoiima. Prior to the collision he had traveled about 185 miles. He left Columbia that night between ten and eleven o’clock. As stated in the majority -opinion-, When plaintiff was meeting the -auto-mobile driven by defendant Williams, both dimmed their lights. Plaintiff’s unoontra-diicted testimony is -as follows: “I was meeting a car and I saw his car [the parked -car] for the first time when I put my lights back on bright. I just saw the -oar in a flash and that w-as it. I would say I ■wais 20 to 30 feet from the rear of the c-ar when I first saw it. This was the car I hit. The car that I was meeting had its lights on and I dimmed my lights. When I put my lights back on bright, I was so close that I coul-d not keep f-rom hitting the -oar. * * * It was a -clea-r, dark night that night. * * * He had j-uist got by me good when I struck the -other -car. I don’t -have an -opinion as to how far I had traveled after I passed him before I struck th-e other car. When I put my *567lights back an bright, I was right on this oar which was parked. I don’t know exactly how fast I was going; I would say 40 or 50 males per hour. When I ©aw the ear that was meeting me, I maintained the same speed right up until I Mb the parked vehicle. I 'did mot hit my brakes because I did not have time. * * * I dio not know how many car lengths I could see ahead of me when my bright lights were on and I don’t know how many car lengths I could see ahead of me when my dim lights were on.”
There are two lines of decisions in our Reports involving highway accidents which turn >on the question of contributory negligence. In Tyson v. Ford, 228 N.C. 778, 47 S.E. 2d 251, and in McClamrock v. Packing Co., 238 N.C. 648, 78 S.E. 2d 749, will be found a list of oases of -this type in which contributory negligence was held as a matter of law ¡to bar recovery, and a second list in which contributory negligence lhae been held to ibe an issue for a jury.
Without -attempting to analyze and distinguish the reasons underlying the decisions in those cases, they illustrate the fact that frequently the point of decision was affected by concurrent circumstances, such ¡as fog, rain, glaring headlights, color of vehicles, etc., and that these conditions must be taken into .consideration in determining the question of contributory negligence and -proximate cause. “Practically every case must stand on its own bottom.” Cole v. Koonce, 214 N.C. 188, 198 S.E. 637. For -a recent case in Which this Court held that the driver was .guilty -of legal contributory negligence in -striking an un-lighted parked car on the highway at night, see Hines v. Brown, 254 N.C. 447, 119 S.E. 2d 182. See also Smith v. Metal Co., 257 N.C. 143, 125 S.E. 2d 377, in- which the driver -of a motor scooter -was- held guilty of legal contributory negligence in striking -an unlighted truck parked at night on a street in the city of Goldsboro. In Burchette v. Distributing Co., 243 N.C. 120, 90 S.E. 2d 232, relied on in the majority opinion, plaintiff testified that the fights on the -tractor “were on- bright; that -the lights blinded him.”
There -is no evidence here of any fog, rain, glaring headlights, etc. In my opinion, plaintiff’s failure under -all the attendant circumstances to decrease his speed of 40 or 50 miles an hour in- meeting and passing the approaching automobile on -a -dark night up to the very second of icoll-iding with the unlighted parked ear establishes facts necessary to show negligence -on plaintiff’s part p-roximately -contributing to -his injuries so cl-early that no other conclusion can be reasonably drawn therefrom, -and -consequently I vote to- sustain the judgment of involuntary nonsuit as to defendant William-s. I concur in -the majority opinion upholding the nonsuit -as to- the defendant Massie.