Court Opinion

ID: 9469053
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 02:30:41.336138+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:41:11.300566
License: Public Domain

HEANEY, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
The only issue is whether the repossession of appellant’s automobile constituted a breach of the peace by creating a “risk of invoking violence.” See Ford Motor Credit Co. v. Herring, 267 Ark. 201, 589 S.W.2d 584, 586 (1979). The trial jury found that it did and awarded $5,000 for conversion. Because that determination was in my view a reasonable one, I dissent from the Court’s decision to overturn it.
Cathy Williams was a single parent living with her two small children in a trailer home in Van Buren, Arkansas. On December 1, 1977, at approximately 4:30 a. m., she was awakened by noises in her driveway. She went into the night to investigate and discovered a wrecker and its crew in the process of towing away her car. According to the trial court, “she ran outside to stop them * * * but she made no strenuous protests to their actions.” (Emphasis added.) In fact, the wrecker crew stepped between her and the car when she sought to retrieve personal items from inside it, although the men retrieved some of the items for her. The commotion created by the incident awakened neighbors in the vicinity.
Facing the wrecker crew in the dead of night, Cathy Williams did everything she could to stop them, short of introducing physical force to meet the presence of the crew. The confrontation did not result in violence only because Ms. Williams did not take such steps and was otherwise powerless to stop the crew.
The controlling law is the UCC, which authorizes self-help repossession only when such is done “without breach of the peace * * *.” Ark.Stat.Ann. § 85-9-503 (Supp. 1981). The majority recognizes that one important policy consideration underlying this restriction is to discourage “extrajudicial acts by citizens when those acts are fraught with the likelihood of resulting violence.” Supra, at 719. Despite this, the majority holds that no reasonable jury could find that the confrontation in Cathy Williams’ driveway at 4:30 a. m. created a risk of violence. I cannot agree. At a minimum, the largely undisputed facts created a jury question. The jury found a breach of the peace and this Court has no sound, much less compelling, reason to overturn that determination.
Indeed, I would think that sound application of the self-help limitation might require a directed verdict in favor of Ms. Williams, but certainly not against her. If a “night raid” is conducted without detection and confrontation, then, of course, there could be no breach of the peace. But where the invasion is detected and a con*721frontation ensues, the repossessor should be under a duty to retreat and turn to judicial process. The alternative which the majority embraces is to allow a repossessor to proceed following confrontation unless and until violence results in fact. Such a rule invites tragic consequences which the law should seek to prevent, not to encourage. I would reverse the trial court and reinstate the jury’s verdict.