Court Opinion

ID: 9578175
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:42:24.593611+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:25:01.720073
License: Public Domain

Currie, J.
{dissenting). The only testimony as to how the accident happened is that of Derleth. He first observed the lights of the approaching Poole car in its own lane of travel. The next time he observed such car it was skidding sideways toward him and the collision took place in Der-leth’s traffic lane, the front of the Derleth automobile striking the center of the left side of the Poole car.
The majority opinion sustains the finding of the jury, that Lyle Poole was causally negligent as to management and control, on the basis that such negligence could be inferred by the jury from the position of the Poole car in being on the wrong side of the center line of the pavement. This is nothing more nor less than applying the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur. It would be a proper application of such principle, if there were absent the undisputed evidence of *72skidding. Hamilton v. Reinemann (1940), 233 Wis. 572, 580, 290 N. W. 194, and Kempfer v. Bois (1949), 255 Wis. 312, 314, 38 N. W. (2d) 483.
Res ipsa loquitur does not apply to skidding so as to permit a jury to infer negligence therefrom. Linden v. Miller (1920), 172 Wis. 20, 22, 177 N. W. 909, and Churchill v. Brock (1953), 264 Wis. 23, 28, 58 N. W. (2d) 290. Therefore, the jury cannot be permitted to speculate as to whether the nonnegligent process of skidding is what caused the Poole car to cross the center line, or whether some negligent act of control and management on the part of Lyle Poole first carried the car across into the opposite traffic lane and the skidding occurred thereafter. Hyer v. Janesville (1898), 101 Wis. 371, 377, 77 N. W. 729, and Wisconsin Telephone Co. v. Matson (1950), 256 Wis. 304, 310, 41 N. W. (2d) 268.
In Wisconsin Telephone Co. v. Matson, supra, this court held it proper to apply the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur to an unexplained running off the highway of a motor vehicle. ITowever, the opinion in that case made it clear that the prior holdings in Klein v. Beeten (1919), 169 Wis. 385, 172 N. W. 736, and Baars v. Benda (1946), 249 Wis. 65, 23 N. W. (2d) 477, were specifically approved. We quote from the opinion in the Wisconsin Telephone Co. Case as follows (256 Wis. p. 310):
“In Klein v. Beeten, supra, and in Baars v. Benda, supra, automobiles ran off the road and passengers were injured. After the accident a flat front tire was found in the first case and a broken steering gear in the second. In each of these actions we held that res ipsa loquitur did not apply because the defects may have preceded and caused the accident or they may have been caused by the car hitting the ditch. The circumstances were as consistent with the non-actionable as with the actionable cause and the jury was not allowed to speculate between them, to guess (as we said *73in Baars v. Benda, p. 69) whether it was the broken steering gear or negligent operation which caused the accident.”
If a flat tire or a broken steering wheel may have either precipitated a car off a highway, or have occurred afterward as a consequence of impact of the collision which resulted, it is equally apparent that in the instant case the skidding may have occurred before the Poole car crossed the center line as well as afterward. The instant holding of the majority opinion is not only a repudiation of Klein v. Beeten, supra, and Baars v. Benda, supra, but also of the rationale of the holding in Wisconsin Telephone Co. v. Matson, supra.
Our decision in Wood v. Indemnity Ins. Co. (1956), 273 Wis. 93, 76 N. W. (2d) 610, is also directly in point. In that case, as in Wisconsin Telephone Co. v. Matson, supra, res ipsa loquitur was applied to hold that an unexplained leaving of the highway by an automobile gave rise to an inference of negligence which would support a jury verdict so finding. The operator was found dead in the car after it collided with a tree. The defendant insurance company contended that the operator may have had a fatal heart attack, and that caused the vehicle to take the course it did. There was no autopsy finding of a heart attack or any other sufficient evidence in the record to establish that a heart attack had occurred. The court’s opinion made it crystal-clear that, if there had been conclusive evidence in the record that the operator had sustained a heart attack, it would not have been necessary to prove that it had occurred before the car left its course in order to rule out res ipsa loquitur. The court again gave its stamp of approval to Baars v. Benda, supra.
This court should not permit its sympathy for the unfortunate plaintiffs to cause it to overrule the prior well-considered holdings of the afore-cited cases. In order for *74the plaintiffs to recover it was essential that they establish that the skidding occurred as a result of some act of negligence, or was aggravated thereby. Coenen v. Van Handel (1955), 269 Wis. 6, 8, 68 N. W. (2d) 435. This the plaintiffs failed to prove.
I am authorized to state that Mr. Justice Brown joins in this dissent.