Bell v. USAA Cas. Ins. Co.

707 So. 2d 102, 1998 La. App. LEXIS 247, 1998 WL 18004
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedFebruary 19, 1998
Docket30172-CA
StatusPublished
Cited by28 cases

This text of 707 So. 2d 102 (Bell v. USAA Cas. Ins. Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bell v. USAA Cas. Ins. Co., 707 So. 2d 102, 1998 La. App. LEXIS 247, 1998 WL 18004 (La. Ct. App. 1998).

Opinion

707 So.2d 102 (1998)

Mike BELL, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants,
v.
USAA CASUALTY INSURANCE COMPANY, et al., Defendants-Appellees.

No. 30172-CA.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Second Circuit.

January 21, 1998.
Opinion Denying Rehearing February 19, 1998.

*104 Allison Anne Jones, Steven Eric Soileau, Shreveport, for Plaintiffs-Appellants.

Brian D. Landry, Shreveport, for Defendants-Appellees LIGA.

Jack E. Carlisle, Jr., Shreveport, for Defendants-Appellees USAA.

Before MARVIN, NORRIS and STEWART, JJ.

NORRIS, Judge.

This is a claim for personal injuries sustained by 12-year-old Darren Bell in a pedestrian-vehicular accident while he was on a field trip with Calvary Baptist Church. The jury found Darren 90% at fault, the church 10% and the driver free of fault; it awarded special damages only. The court granted JNOV, awarding general damages and loss of consortium. The Bells appeal, contesting both the allocation of fault and quantum. The church, its youth director, Michael Johnson, and their insurer, LIGA,[1] have answered the appeal, as have the driver, Mrs. Kiesewetter, *105 and her insurer, USAA. We affirm the judgment insofar as it absolved Mrs. Kiesewetter and awarded general damages; however, we reallocate fault between Darren and the church, and reverse the award of lost consortium.

Factual background

The accident occurred on Jackson Street in Alexandria on the Sunday before Thanksgiving 1994. Calvary Baptist Church of Shreveport took a group of its teenage members to a youth evangelism conference being held there that week. Darren was two weeks shy of his 13th birthday and perhaps the youngest person on the trip; most attendees were high school age. He also suffered from cerebral palsy which affected his left arm and slowed his gait somewhat, but by all accounts he was otherwise a healthy and intelligent young man. Because of Darren's maturity and fine performance in Bible drill, youth minister Michael Johnson gave him permission to join this trip. Johnson (called "Brother Mike" by most of the witnesses) took 37 teenagers and four adult chaperones in a church minibus and a van. They left for Alexandria at 3:30 Sunday afternoon.

After checking in at their motel, the group went to McDonald's on Jackson Street, a four-lane east-west thoroughfare with no median, densely settled and heavily traveled. By then it was at least twilight; most witnesses said the sky was dark but the area well lighted. The influx of Calvary's teenagers crowded the McDonald's, filling all serving lines, but there was a small pizza parlor in a strip mall across the street and slightly to the west, with apparently no waiting. Several of the boys in the group decided they would prefer to eat pizza without the wait.

The witnesses' accounts diverge in certain particulars. After the students exited the church vehicles, all or most of them filed into McDonald's; Johnson either stood outside the double glass doors to make sure that no one left, or went inside briefly to see that everyone was orderly in the lines. A group of older boys (Jonathan Falloon, Jared Freeman and Jay Baker, all about 16 years old) came to Johnson and asked him if they could leave, cross the street and get pizza. Johnson said yes, and testified that he walked them to the street to make sure they crossed safely. He explained that he did not lead the boys to a nearby traffic light because he considered that more dangerous. Jonathan Falloon testified that Johnson walked them part of the way to the street; Jay Baker had no recollection of whether he walked with them or not. Jonathan also testified that traffic was not bad at the time, so they walked across the street.

Meanwhile, three slightly younger boys (Robby Falloon, Tim Chance and Jonathan Gates) decided they would also like to get pizza. Robby Falloon testified that he asked Johnson, specifically, for permission to do this; Tim Chance recalled that none of this group got specific permission, but just "assumed" it was OK since the other boys were going; and Johnson thought that when Jonathan Falloon had asked permission to leave, it was on behalf of six or seven students. Tim and Robby testified that they ran past the first group in the middle of Jackson Street, in an effort to be first in line for pizza.

The students described the traffic as light to moderate at the time; Tim Chance said he was buzzed by a speeding minivan coming from the right when he was in the middle of the street. Also, nobody recalled seeing Darren at this time; the students, as well as Johnson, assumed he was inside McDonald's.

Darren testified that when he saw the other boys going to the pizza place, he decided he was too hungry to wait at McDonald's. He did not ask Johnson or any of the chaperones for permission to leave; he just "jogged" into the street at an angle, without stopping or looking. In the middle of the street, he saw headlights to his right. He lifted his right arm defensively and was knocked to the ground. He recalls nothing until he woke up at Saint Frances Cabrini Hospital.

The driver of the minivan, Mrs. Kiesewetter, was driving west on Jackson. She testified that she had been waiting at a red light just before the McDonald's, and was in the left lane behind two or three other vehicles; there were also a few cars in the right lane.

*106 When the light turned green, she started forward slowly, but noticed the brake lights on a car to her right. She then saw "two or three kids jogging across the street." She did not brake, but panned the street and saw no one else crossing. Then, when she had almost passed McDonald's she suddenly saw Darren immediately to her left. With no time to brake, she swerved slightly to her right. Nevertheless Darren ran into the side of the minivan, striking the front left quarter panel and the driver's side mirror. After impact, Mrs. Kiesewetter screeched to a halt and U-turned to where Darren lay in the street.

An additional witness, a Ms. Cooper, testified she was driving east on Jackson; as she neared McDonald's she saw "two little groups of boys" running across the street. Although she was not going fast, she had to brake to avoid hitting one of them. She saw no adults standing near the street, and testified that she saw the impact between one boy and a minivan in her rear view mirror.

Darren sustained a broken right arm, mild concussion, bruised kidney and bitten tongue. Doctors at Saint Frances performed an open reduction on his comminuted humerus, and Darren had some blood in his urine. He stayed in the hospital from Sunday night to Tuesday afternoon, and came home wearing an arm-length cast. This was later replaced by shorter casts. He had a brief episode of double vision in late December, which a neurologist attributed to the concussion. Swelling from the fracture compressed his ulnar nerve, necessitating surgery in mid-February 1995, followed by another several weeks in arm casts.

All the time spent with his right arm in a cast or in therapy were hard on Darren, as his left arm was already disabled by cerebral palsy. During this time he was unable to feed himself, dress, or attend to personal hygiene; his parents had to assist him. Feeling that the accident and injury had made Darren withdrawn and moody, the Bells took him to a psychiatrist for two visits in 1995. By the second visit, the depression had resolved. The treating orthopedist concluded that Darren had no residual disability from the accident.

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Bluebook (online)
707 So. 2d 102, 1998 La. App. LEXIS 247, 1998 WL 18004, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bell-v-usaa-cas-ins-co-lactapp-1998.