Dunn v. Stephens

435 S.W.2d 886, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2263
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedDecember 6, 1968
DocketNo. 17178
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 435 S.W.2d 886 (Dunn v. Stephens) 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
Dunn v. Stephens, 435 S.W.2d 886, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2263 (Tex. Ct. App. 1968).

Opinion

DIXON, Chief Justice.

This is an appeal from a summary judgment in favor of defendants, appellees here, in a suit in which the plaintiffs, appellants here, sought recovery of exemplary damages.

The suit was brought by Alice Faye Dunn, surviving widow of Earnest Nebraska Dunn, and by Dunn’s heirs at law pursuant to Art. 16, § 26, of the Constitution of Texas, Vernon’s Ann.St., and Articles 8306, Sec. 5, and 4673, Vernon’s Ann. Civ.St. Workmen’s Compensation benefits have already been paid.

In one point on appeal appellants attack the summary judgment on the ground that the record discloses fact issues as to gross negligence and proximate cause on the part of appellees.

Earnest Nebraska Dunn was killed when he was run over by a winch truck driven by appellee R. M. Stephens, construction superintendent for appellee Robert J. Sa-binske, who does business as National Development Company. Appellees were engaged on grading and excavating work in connection with a lakeside resort development close to Cedar Creek Lake in Henderson County.

Suit was originally filed in Henderson County. Stephens and Sabinske filed pleas of privilege seeking to have the cause transferred to Dallas County for trial. The trial court overruled their pleas, but on appeal the Tyler Court of Civil Appeals reversed the trial court’s judgment and ordered the cause transferred to Dallas County. Stephens v. Dunn, 417 S.W.2d 608 (Tex.Civ.App., Tyler, 1967, no writ).

Appellees contend that the determination of the issues in the venue proceedings constitutes the law of the case respect to the summary judgment here on appeal and is determinative of the facts here involved. We do not agree with ap-pellees for two reasons.

1. In venue hearings where the plaintiff relies on Art. 1995, Subd. 9a, V.A. C.S., the statute itself recites that the burden is on the plaintiff to prove that the alleged act of negligence occurred in the county of suit and that it was a proximate cause of plaintiff’s injuries. Conflicts in the evidence raising fact issues are to be determined by a preponderance of the evidence.

In summary judgment proceedings, on the other hand, the burden is on the moving party, whether he be plaintiff or defendant, to show that there is no genuine issue of material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. All doubts as to the existence of a genuine issue of fact must be resolved against the movant. Conflicts in the evidence will be disregarded and the court will accept as true all evidence of the opposing party which tends to support such party’s contention. Rule 166-A, Vernon’s Texas Rules of Civil Procedure; Great American Reserve Ins. Co. v. San Antonio Plumbing Supply Co., 391 S.W.2d 41 (Tex.Sup.1965); Tigner v. First Nat. Bank of Angleton, 153 Tex. 69, 264 S.W.2d 85 (1954).

2. Additional evidence, not presented at the venue hearing, was adduced at the hearing on the motion for summary judgment in the form of an affidavit by Lloyd Dyess, who swears that he witnessed the tragedy.

On the occasion when Dunn was fatally injured Stephens and a crew of helpers were digging a channel to be connected with the lake. This channel was to be 100 to 125 feet wide and 10 feet deep. It was to be a finger of the lake with home [888]*888sites fronting on it so that home owners would have easy access to the lake waters for the launching of boats and other purposes. The channel, had been about half finished.

Dunn had been hired by Stephens about two weeks earlier to operate a bulldozer. While he was driving on a slope of the channel the machine jumped its track. It was decided to use the winch truck to pull the bulldozer back on its track. But the motor of the winch truck died and would not start again due to battery trouble. Two tractors were then called into action. Chains were attached to the truck and it was towed a sufficient distance to start its engine. Dunn then detached the chains from the truck and was walking up the slope carrying the chains.

Stephens meantime had started backing the truck up the slope and had swerved in order to turn the vehicle around. It was then that the truck ran over Dunn. Another employee of Sabinske’s, Lloyd Dyess, says he shouted to Stephens that he had run over a man. Stephens says he did not hear Dyess. Somehow in operating the truck Stephens ran over Dunn a second time. Dunn died about thirty minutes later before reaching a hospital.

The record before us consists of the pleadings, depositions, the statements of facts prepared for the appeal in the venue case, and the affidavit of Lloyd Dyess. Neither Stephens nor Sabinske filed affidavits in support of their motion for summary judgment.

The affidavit of Dyess contains additional evidence which was not presented in the venue hearing. We quote from the affidavit:

“Ernie Dunn was killed on the west slope of one of the channels, when R. M. Stephens, while backing up the slope, backed over Ernie Dunn with the back dual wheels of a truck being used on the project and owned by Mr. Sabinske. On the day that Ernie Dunn was killed, he had been operating a bulldozer and had thrown the track. We were going to use the truck which ran over Ernie Dunn in order to get the track back on the bulldozer. The truck was in the bottom of a channel Tuning north and south. The channel was sloped upwardly at about a 45 degree angle. The bottom of the channel was approximately 40 feet wide. The slope on the west side of the channel was 30 to 40 steps. Ernie Dunn was killed seven steps down from the top of the slope.
The last few days before Ernie Dunn was killed, R. M. Stephens cursed him quite a bit in front of me and the other workers. A day or two before the accident Ernie Dunn and I were sitting around eating our lunch when out of the clear blue R. M. Stephens told him ‘if you would shut your God damn mouth, you might get more work done.’ R. M. Stephens acted like he was mad because Ernie was saying anything to his fellow employees and seemed to me like he held a grudge against Ernie. Two or three days before the accident, R. M. Stephens told me that he was firing Ernie.”
“After we got it started, Ernie Dunn unhitched the chains with which we pulled the truck from the truck and tractor and started carring the chains up the west slope of the channel toward a pickup. I pulled my tractor up and parked it. Ernie Dunn had put the chains, one end on his shoulder and one end in his hand, and had started up the slope on an angle sort of in a southwesterly direction from the truck.

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435 S.W.2d 886, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2263, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/dunn-v-stephens-texapp-1968.