Court Opinion

ID: 9672205
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:50:46.954856+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:14.908580
License: Public Domain

*401SEILER, Judge
(dissenting).
I concur in Judge Stone’s dissent that having undertaken repairs and maintenance the defendant contractor was obligated to exercise ordinary care for the safety of others using the road, but I would also hold that the defendant was liable on the basis that it had negligently created a dangerous condition in a public road making it unsafe for public travel, which it seems to me comes within the first pleaded assignment of negligence about overloading the trucks and driving them at an unreasonable rate of speed. It is possible to do a lawful act on a highway in the sense of complying with certain limitations and yet do it negligently. It happens frequently in automobile negligence cases, where compliance with the legislative minimum “ * * * does not prevent a finding that a reasonable man would have taken additional precautions where the situation is such as to call for them * * * ”, Restatement of Torts 2d, Sec. 288C, Comment, p. 40; Gerdel v. Broccard (Mo.Sup.) 428 S.W.2d 492, 496; Silvey v. Missouri Pacific Railroad (Mo.Sup.), Div. Two, 445 S.W.2d 354, decided September 8, 1969.
The majority opinion finds no liability under plaintiff’s first assignment because “a lawful act performed on the highway in a lawful manner does not give rise to an action in tort.” It is respectfully submitted this assumes the very thing in question — i. e., that defendant’s actions were lawful acts done in a lawful manner. It is a jury question whether knowingly driving extremely heavily loaded trucks every five minutes over a soft spot in a highway in such a way as to rut out or create a trench or hole dangerous to the traveling public is a lawful act done in a lawful manner or an unlawful act done in an unlawful manner.
Even though it was operating its trucks within the speed limits and within the weight limitations for the trucks, defendant could see what the trucks were doing to the road and as a resonable person could thereby foresee a risk of injury to others using the highway. The duty thus arose to use the requisite care to avoid such risk and if that negligence was the proximate cause of plaintiff’s injury, then defendant would be liable, assuming plaintiff was not guilty of contributory negligence, which I agree was a jury question under the facts before us. The facts present all the elements of a negligent tort: a duty on the defendant not to use the road in such a way as to make it dangerous for plaintiff or other users, conduct on the part of the defendant involving a foreseeable risk of injury to those in the position of plaintiff, failure on part of defendant to exercise reasonable care to avoid such risk, and proximate cause.
Finally, it seems to me the majority opinion establishes a dubious public policy — namely, that an operator can use our public highways in such an extreme manner as to destroy them with impunity. Public highways, including secondary highways, are too important and costly these days to be exposed to such use without recourse. The majority opinion removes any incentive for reasonable restraint by a heavy operator. In the words of the old English proverb, he is free to “Ride a free Horse to Death, and never mind what becomes of him afterwards.”