Court Opinion

ID: 9663721
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 23:49:18.673078+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:44:19.544048
License: Public Domain

Clinton, J.,
concurring.
I believe the dissent of Newton, J., requires a response.
Where reasonable minds may differ as to whether certain conduct may be characterized as violating the reasonable man standard and therefore be determined to be negligent, a jury question is presented. This is such a case. The dissent does not fairly describe the evidence on the issue of contributory negligence nor the possible inferences which the jury would be entitled to draw from it. Four points need to be noted.
(1) The dissent assumes the parked truck was illuminated by the headlights of the police car. There was evidence from which the jury could conclude otherwise. The plaintiff testified the parked car was immediately to his left just before the collision. This would mean the police car was a little to the south of the truck. The police officers testified the car was about two car lengths north of the truck.
(2) The jury could have properly concluded that the police officer did not give any effective warning by his presence and waving the flashlight which the plaintiff could have seen in time to avoid the collision. The speed of the plaintiff’s car was variously estimated at 40 to 55 miles per hour. One officer testified that when he saw the plaintiff’s oncoming car he ran south toward it and was 1 block south of the truck when the *680plaintiff’s car passed him. He also testified that at the time of the impact he was within two to two and a half car lengths of the truck. He therefore must have run back toward the scene at a speed which approached at least 35 miles per hour. The jury was not required to believe this and consequently doubt is created as to what the officer did.
The other officer stated he was just to the left of the truck immediately before the impact and apparently was not aware the collision was about to occur until just a “split second” before the collision when he became aware of the “glare” of the lights of the oncoming car. He took two or three steps away from the truck. There was an immediate exchange of conversation between him and his fellow officer. It was as follows: “Well, I immediately — I heard — I heard my co-officer ask — Robert Taylor ask if we needed the unit. I hollered, I asked him if we needed the unit. There was an exchange of conversation. He wanted to know if I was all right and so I went immediately to the cruiser without ever going to the McClellen car and I called the emergency unit. I took Officer Taylor’s word that we needed a unit and then I went to the car.”
The plaintiff testified: “As I approached the headlights, after I had went through the headlights of the car parked there, it was immediately to my left, the car, as I looked out the window to the left, I seen somebody standing beside the car and that is the last I remember.” This testimony would tend to support the conclusion not only that the officer was not where he said he was, but also that the police car was south of the truck and illuminated it not at all.
The jury could have concluded that the testimony of the officer to the warning signals he gave was not accurate. It may very well have given consideration to the fact that the officer, who admittedly overlooked (although both officers had been at the scene long enough to make a rather thorough inspection of the *681truck) the simple expedient of turning on the flasher with which the police car was equipped and which expedient might possibly be regarded as a standard procedure, might very well not have been alert enough to have given the flashlight signals exactly as claimed.
(3) The description of the truck, its color, its load, its lack of lights, the background, the effect of the admittedly bright lights (even on low beam) of the police car on the vision of the plaintiff, clearly brings this case within the exceptions to the assured clear distance ahead doctrine.
(4) The dissent interprets the plaintiff’s testimony as compelling a finding as a matter of law that he did not look at all and failed to see what was in plain sight. The dissent quotes only a small portion of the testimony on the point. The entire testimony including that quoted would support a conclusion that if the plaintiff looked directly at the headlights of the police car they were bright enough to be blinding and that for that reason he focused his gaze right and forward to the full extent that his low beam light reached. This is not a total failure to maintain a lookout. It is probably a practice followed by most drivers passing oncoming cars with especially bright lights.
A jury question was presented.
Spencer, J., joins in this concurrence.