Court Opinion

ID: 9833114
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 22:27:39.429086+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:59.810392
License: Public Domain

*141On Motion for Rehearing.
The motion for rehearing in this case is •purely formal, consisting as it does of complaints that this court erred in overruling the 81 assignments of error and propositions in support thereof as presented in appellant’s -original brief. Upon the submission of the motion, however, appellant filed a vigorous written argument especially complaining of •our action: First, in refusing to set aside the order of the trial court which overruled appellant’s motion for a new trial on the ground of misconduct of the jury in the matter of examining the timber and tail-light of the truck which had been offered in evidence by the defendant; second, in reversing the trial court’s ruling that the ex parte deposition of appellee should not be taken as confessed; and, third, in failing to discuss and in overruling appellant’s propositions 23,. 23a, 34, and 34a.
We think appellee in her reply brief sufficiently disposes of these special contentions, but in view of the earnestness with which appellant has urged the special complaints above indicated, we will add, in addition to what we have said in our original opinion, that the question of whether the taillight on appellant’s truck was in a condition rendering it impossible for it to have been lighted at the time of the accident was not specifically presented as an issue in the pleadings. Appellant’s answer, so far as it related to this question, was merely a general denial of the alleged fact that it was not burning at the time of the collision. The evidence tending to show, as more particularly developed by the jury, that the condition of the light was such that it could not have been burning at the time of the accident, was not the ultimate fact necessary to support plaintiff’s case. It was merely evidentiary and corroborative of the evidence introduced in behalf of appellee on the trial that the light was not burning. The tail-light and wood to which it was attached was voluntarily offered in evidence on behalf of appellant and' voluntarily submitted to the jury during the argument and no exception made to its having been passed to the jury. It may be true, as insisted, that the object of its introduction was to show the force of the impact of the car in which appellee was riding and thus corroborate appellant’s contention that the driver of the car and appellee were guilty, of negligence in driving at a terrific rate of speed; but there is nothing to show that the jury did not give due consideration of this contention, and we remain of the opinion that appellant is in no position to complain that the jury also observed other conditions of the exhibit corroborative of other evidence which of itself sufficiently supports the vital issue of whether the tail-light was burning at the time of the collision.
Ve deem it unnecessary to add to what we said in our original opinion relating to the ex parte deposition of appellee, particularly in view of appellee’s answer to the contention in this respect; but we perhaps Should here briefly call attention to the complaint that we should have considered and sustained appellant’s propositions 23, 23a, 34 and 34a, Propositions 34 and 34a complain of the refusal of the trial court to sustain an exception to the court’s following special issue No. 2, which reads thus: “Do you find frpm a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant’s truck which was hit by the Dodge coupe was being operated at the time same was struck without a tail light burning?” The exception to this charge was that it was “upon the weight of the evidence, misleading and particularly in this: because it does not inquire whether the defendant or his agent, Kearns, used ordinary prudence to see that the tail light was burning and does not inquire whether the tail light had just recently been burning and whether a person of ordinary prudence would have discovered that the same was not burning at the moment of the accident, and whether or not the driver Kearns knew that the same was not burning at the moment of the accident or in the exercise of ordinary care would have discovered that same was not then burning if, in fact, it was not.”
Propositions 23 and 23a were to the effect that the court erred in refusing to give appellant’s requested issue No. 9, which reads thus: “If in answer to special issue No. 2 you say ‘yes’, then do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that Mr. Thomas W. Kearns, the driver of the Ford truck in question, knew that the tail lamp was not burning at the time it was struck by the Dodge car.”
It is insisted that it thus conclusively appears that the trial court committed reversible error, the following cases being cited in support of this contention: Taber v. Smith, 26 S.W. (2d) 722, by the Amarillo Court of Civil Appeals, and Berkovitz v. American River Gravel Co., 191 Cal. 195, 215 P. 675, by the Supreme Court of California, citing Sheerin & Redfield, Negligence, para. 467.
The trial court gave approved definitions of “negligence,” “proximate cause,” “new and independent cause,” “unavoidable accident,” and “contributory negligence,” and in addition to special issue No. 2, special issue No. 3 reads:
“If you have answered special issue No. 2 ‘yes,’ then answer:
“Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the collision mentioned in special issue No. 2 occurred after dark?”
To this the jury answered, “Xes.”
Special issue No, 4 reads:
*142“If yon have answered special issues Nos. 2 and 3 both ‘yes’, then answer this issue:
“Do you find from a preponderance of the . evidence that >such conduct on the part of the employee of the said W. P. Lincoln, defendant, in so driving and operating said truck at said time constituted negligence as that term negligence has been heretofore defined?”
The answer to this was, “Tes.”
The jury then further found that this negligence was the proximate cause of the injury.
While the driver of the truck’ in question testified to the effect that he had examined the lights on his car shortly before the accident and that the tail-light was then burning, the answer of the defendant to plaintiff’s contention consisted of a denial of plaintiff’s allegation that the tail-light was not burning. There was no specific allegation to the effect that if mistaken in this respect it yet was true that the driver of the truck was justifiably ignorant of the fact, having exercised ordinary care under the circumstances to see that it was burning. The issue of whether the light was butning was distinct from the issue of whether its failure to burn was unknown to the driver, and also distinct from the further issue of whether the failure of the light to burn at the time of the accident was due to a want of ordinary care on the part of the driver. It was not necessary, if indeed proper, to embody in special issue No. 2 as given by'the court the element of due care on the part of the driver, and if the driver failed to use due care to keep the tail-light burning, the fact that at the particular time he was without knowledge of its failure to burn as sought by appellant’s requested issue No. 9 was immaterial. There was no special request on the part of appellant that the issue of care on the part of the driver be submitted, and as it seems to us the court’s charge in a general way embodied this element. By reference to the court’s special issue No. 4 the jury was required to find in event of their affirmative answers to special issues 2 and 3 whether the driver was guilty, of negligence in operating the truck at the time. Nowhere does the charge assume that the mere failure to have the light burning at the time was negligence per se. It was not so alleged by the plaintiff, nor was it so submitted by the court, and in this respect the case is distinguishable from Taber v. Smith and Berkovitz v. American River Gravel Company, cited above in behalf of appellant.
We will not further amplify the record, already voluminous, but conclude by saying that on the whole we have been unable to agree that the trial court committed reversible error in the particulars urged.
The motion for rehearing is accordingly overruled.