Brown v. Brisco

464 S.W.2d 683, 1971 Tex. App. LEXIS 2752
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedFebruary 24, 1971
DocketNo. 11794
StatusPublished

This text of 464 S.W.2d 683 (Brown v. Brisco) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Brown v. Brisco, 464 S.W.2d 683, 1971 Tex. App. LEXIS 2752 (Tex. Ct. App. 1971).

Opinion

O’QUINN, Justice.

This is a suit for damages growing out of a rear-end collision on a public road in Comal County.

Mrs. Alene G. Brown, appellant, brought this action to recover damages for personal injuries she alleged were sustained July 14, 1968, when the pickup she was driving was struck from behind by an automobile owned by Jennie Jo Brisco but then being driven by her son, Sidney Charles Brisco. The accident occurred on the Old Sattler Road, on a Sunday morning shortly before 11 o’clock, about thirteen miles north of New Braunfels.

Immediately before the accident Mrs. Brown slowed her vehicle to avoid striking an armadillo on the highway, and the Brisco car, traveling in the same direction, collided with the rear of the Brown pickup.

Upon findings of the jury, the trial court entered judgment that plaintiff, Mrs. Brown, take nothing, from which judgment Mrs. Brown has appealed.

Appellant brings nineteen points of error, and states her position that the “ * * verdict, judgment and order are all without any support of evidence as a matter of law, and therefore they are the result of fundamental error of the jury and the trial court of gross character.” Appellant further asserts, “The findings of the jury and the judgment of the trial court are so contrary to the evidence as to be clearly wrong and unjust under the record of the case as now presented.”

The jury failed to find that Brisco (1) kept an improper lookout, (2) failed to apply his brakes, (3) and was driving imprudently close to Mrs. Brown’s pickup. The jury did find that Brisco failed to alter the course of his vehicle, but that such failure was not negligence. The jury found the [684]*684collision was not the result of an unavoidable accident.

The jury absolved Mrs. Brown of failure to keep a proper lookout, but found that she suddenly decreased the speed of her vehicle just prior to the accident and that such decrease in speed was negligence and a proximate cause of the collision. The jury acquitted Mrs. Brown of failure to give a signal that she was slowing down and found it was not negligence for her not to increase the speed of her pickup immediately prior to the accident.

The jury found that Mrs. Brown incurred charges for medical services and treatment as a result of the accident in the amount of $230, but that she was not entitled to any compensation for future medical expenses.

Under the first eight points of error appellant contends that the jury’s findings that Brisco (1) did not fail to keep a proper lookout, (2) did not fail in exercise of ordinary care to apply his brakes, (3) was not driving imprudently close to the Brown vehicle, and that (4) failure to change the course of his vehicle was not negligence were supported by no evidence and were against the overwhelming weight and preponderance of the evidence.

We have examined the entire record with care, and we conclude that such findings of the jury were supported by legally sufficient evidence and that the findings were not against the overwhelming weight and preponderance of the evidence.

It is undisputed that the accident happened on the Old Sattler Road, a hard-surface roadway about sixteen feet wide which affords ample room for two vehicles to meet and pass, or for one vehicle to overtake and pass another traveling in the same direction. The parties are in agreement that the roadway in the area of the collision is straight, slightly undulating, but affording a clear view for a distance of several hundred yards in each direction from the point of impact. The road surface was dry and the day of the accident was clear. The paved portion of the roadway was bordered on each side by grassy shoulders upon which a vehicle might be driven with safety.

There were three eyewitnesses to the collision and to the events leading up to the accident. Both Mrs. Brown and Sidney Brisco testified. Testimony was introduced from Charles Ezell who was driving a pickup, meeting the Brown and the Brisco vehicles immediately before the collision. Ezell also saw the vehicles in his rear view mirror as they collided and heard the impact.

Ezell, who at the time of the accident in July, 1968, was a chemist for the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, was driving a State owned pickup westerly along Old Sattler Road and met the Brown pickup and the Brisco car traveling easterly on the road. Ezell testified that he and another employe of the department traveling with him had stopped at Kanz store, situated on the road “a short distance” from the scene of the collision, and shortly after leaving saw an armadillo crossing the road in front of them from right to left. Ezell observed Mrs. Brown’s pickup approaching, meeting the State pickup, with the Brisco car following the Brown vehicle.

When first observed, Ezell testified, Mrs. Brown’s car was “probably 100 feet, 150 feet” from the armadillo. At that time Ezell was passing the animal as it moved into the traffic lane ahead of the Brown and Brisco vehicles. Ezell testified that as Mrs. Brown “ * * * got just even with me * * * she was reducing her speed”, and after Mrs. Brown passed, Ezell stated, “I looked in the rear view mirror and her stop lights were on, and she was braking, as I recall, rather rapidly. She wasn’t skidding her tires, but she was slowing.”

Ezell testified, “ * * * after I had glanced in the rear view mirror and saw that Mrs. Brown was stopping or braking, I looked up the road and saw the other car [685]*685[Brisco] possibly a hundred feet up the road approaching.” Ezell testified that at that time the Brown pickup was “50 to 60 feet” behind Ezell and that the distance between the Brisco car and the Brown pickup “was somewhere between 100, 200 feet.” Ezell testified that Brisco “wasn’t driving at an excessive speed. I would say he was traveling in the range of 35 to possibly 40 to 45 miles an hour.” Under cross examination Ezell testified that as the Brown pickup and the Brisco car were traveling along the road, prior to the moment Mrs. Brown started reducing her speed, the two vehicles were “five to six” car lengths apart.

Ezell testified that he was driving between thirty and forty miles an hour and that the time elapsing between the moment Mrs. Brown started braking her pickup and the moment of impact was “five to ten seconds.”

Ezell stated that as Brisco “got almost even with me he was looking in our direction.” Ezell’s description of the collision, from that point on, is found in the following dialogue:

“Q But as he passed you did you observe him to be braking or slowing that speed [35 to 45 miles per hour] at all?

“A No, sir, not immediately, I did not.

“Q Having observed the armadillo, the Brown car and Mr. Brisco’s, did you formulate an opinion prior to the collision that one was about to occur?

“A Yes, sir, I did.

“Q Did you make — What caused you to make this observation?

“A Well, first, of course, I had noticed Mrs. Brown braking her car and the mere fact that Mr. Brisco was looking in our direction and I knew Mrs. Brown was braking her car, rather fast. I didn’t see hardly how he could avoid hitting Mrs. Brown’s car.

“Q Did you continue to observe him in your rear view mirror?

A Yes, sir.

Q Did you see the collision occur ?

“A I saw glass fly, yes, sir.”

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464 S.W.2d 683, 1971 Tex. App. LEXIS 2752, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/brown-v-brisco-texapp-1971.