Court Opinion

ID: 9639318
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 16:12:24.856499+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:15.808137
License: Public Domain

Henderson, J.,
filed the following dissenting opinion.
I regret that I am unable to agree with the opinion of the Court in this case on any of the points discussed. On the first point I think the case might well be entitled “The Undue Haste of Mrs. Hurry”.
The opinion recognizes that under the boulevard cases a favored driver cannot be found guilty of negligence contributing to the happening of an accident merely because of a failure to observe an unfavored vehicle or to anticipate that it will fail to stop or yield the right of way. The fact that this intersection was controlled by flashing red and amber lights rather than stop signs does not prevent the application of the boulevard rule, as was held in State v. Marvil Package Co., 202 Md. 592. Cf. Belle Isle Cab Co. v. Pruitt, 187 Md. 174, 181, cited in the Marvil case, where it was said that warning or cautionary signs “cannot have the effect of limiting the privilege of uninterrupted travel on a favored highway which the statute confers.” In the Marvil case the fact that the favored driver did not look to right or left in going through the intersection or see the other car until an instant before the collision did not prevent the Court from holding that the proximate cause of the collision, as a matter of law, was the action of the unfavored driver.
*42In Sun Cab Co., Inc. v. Hall, 199 Md. 461, the Court found that a jury question was presented against the favored driver because of testimony of a passenger that the unfavored driver entered the intersection when the favored vehicle was one-third of a block away and that the cab driver, had he been looking, could have seen it in the intersection and could have stopped in time to avoid the collision. The case of Baltimore Transit Co. v. O’Donovan, 197 Md. 274, was distinguished on this ground. The Sun Cab case is the only case since Greenfeld v. Hook, 177 Md. 116 (1939), where this Court has found facts to warrant submission of a case to the jury in a boulevard situation as against a favored driver. In both of those cases the situation was analogized to one of last clear chance. The case of White v. Yellow Cab Company, 216 Md. 286, 289, limits the Sun Cab case to situations where there is evidence that the favored driver could have stopped after he saw or should have seen the other vehicle in a position of peril. During this whole time the legislature has made no relevant change in the applicable statutes, and as Judge Marked, for the Court, observed in Sonnenburg v. Monumental Tours, 198 Md. 227, 233, “Decisions of this court construing the statute become part of the statute and continue to be so unless and until changed by statute.”
The Sonnenburg case (p. 237) was taken from the jury because “If he had looked later than he says he looked, without slowing down and bringing the bus into control, there is no evidence that he could have avoided the accident.” Cf. Schwartz v. Price, 215 Md. 43, 48. In Baltimore Transit Co. v. O’Donovm, supra, it was argued that a case was made out because the unfavored driver testified that his motor stalled, blocking the intersection, and he tried twice to start it, but it was held that testimony that the car blocked the intersection for a matter of seconds was not sufficient in the absence of testimony as to where the favored vehicle was at that time. In Shriner v. Mullhausen, 210 Md. 104, 113, the “passing” cases were distinguished, and it was pointed out that the obligation to yield the right of way extends to the entire passage across the favored highway. It was held *43(p. 118) that the favored driver was not guilty of negligence under any theory of last clear chance, although the blocking of the highway must have been visible to the favored driver when she came over the crest of a hill several hundred feet away, because she was confronted with an unanticipated emergency.
None of the cases cited in the opinion in the instant case supports the conclusion here reached on the facts. They are cited not for what they hold but for what they say by way of prudent disclaimer as to how far the court might go under other circumstances. Reliance upon such disclaimers tends to obscure that clear and consistent line of demarcation which, whether abstractly correct or not, this court should always seek to lay clown for the guidance of the bench and bar. I am unable to distinguish the cases cited on their facts.
There were twT0 different versions of the collision in the instant case. Mrs. Hurry and her passenger testified that she stopped at the intersection, proceeded into it and stalled in the middle. Neither witness saw the favored vehicle until just before the impact and so could not testify as to whether the favored vehicle could have been stopped or not. They testified the favored vehicle struck the unfavored one on the right side. Under the cases cited the passenger’s estimate that the car remained stalled for a few seconds is not enough to support an inference that the favored vehicle could have been stopped, wholly apart from the question of the emergency with which the favored driver was presented.
The other version is that of Mrs. Harper and her passenger. Mrs. Harper testified she saw the other car and thought it would stop. She had slowed down for the blinking light. The other car did not stop for the intersection and struck the left side of her car. Her passenger agreed, except that she anticipated that the other car was not going to stop, and tried to warn Mrs. Harper, but when she did, Mrs. Harper asked, “Where?"’, just at the moment of impact. Under the cases cited I think the testimony is insufficient to support an inference that had Mrs. Harper been more attentive, she could have anticipated that the other car would fail to stop and *44yield the right of way and that she could have then avoided the collision by stopping. There is no evidence, above speculation, as to how close the vehicles were at the moment of intrusion.
As the cases demonstrate, a favored driver is not obligated to anticipate that an unfavored driver will disregard the statutory injunction, and, except in rare situations analogous to last clear chance, the proximate cause of the accident is the unlawful intrusion of the unfavored car. That principle was clearly laid down in Sun Cab Co. v. Faulkner, 163 Md. 477 (1932), a case which has been repeatedly cited and followed. I think the Court should have directed a verdict in favor of Mrs. Harper.
Passing the point as to the Court’s instructions, which, I think, did not meet the tests so recently laid down in Eastern Contractors, Inc. v. State, 225 Md. 112, I think the Court committed reversible error in excluding the testimony of the State policeman. If he had been allowed to reconstruct the accident from the observed physical facts, as he was qualified to do (cf. Acme Poultry Corp. v. Melville, 188 Md. 365, 373), it might have thrown a clear light upon which version of the accident was correct. If, for example, he had testified that the front of the unfavored vehicle struck the side of the favored one, it would have tended to discredit the testimony of Mrs. Hurry and her passenger that her car stalled in the middle of the road before the impact.
Finally, I cannot agree that the action of the plaintiff’s counsel in calculating upon a blackboard the per diem value he placed upon the plaintiff’s pain and suffering was not prejudicial. For present purposes I assume, without deciding, as do the majority of the Court, that the argument was improper. See Botta v. Brunner, 138 A. 2d 713 (N. J.), and Henne v. Balick, 146 A. 2d 394 (Del.). In Certified T. V. & Appliance Co. v. Harrington, 109 S. E. 2d 126 (Va.), the court reversed a judgment and ordered a new trial as to damages alone, although the verdict was considerably less than the amount so demonstrated. I find it difficult to say that the error was cured by verdict, when it is impossible *45to say whether the jury might or might not have rendered a smaller verdict if the improper argument had not been made. I think this Court should have considered the question on its merits.