Houston Transit Co. v. Farrack

403 S.W.2d 184, 1966 Tex. App. LEXIS 3035
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedMay 5, 1966
DocketNo. 14743
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 403 S.W.2d 184 (Houston Transit Co. v. Farrack) 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
Houston Transit Co. v. Farrack, 403 S.W.2d 184, 1966 Tex. App. LEXIS 3035 (Tex. Ct. App. 1966).

Opinion

WERLEIN, Justice.

Appellee, Alfred Paul Farrack, an employee of appellant, sued appellant to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by him as a result of being crushed between a parked truck owned by appellant and a bus owned and operated by it. From the judgment of the court based on the jury verdict appellant has perfected its appeal.

The truck at the time of the injury to ap-pellee was parked facing west, close to the right hand curb of Sunset Boulevard in Houston, and was being used for the purpose of trimming tree branches overhanging the Boulevard in about the 2000 block thereof. At about 10 o’clock on the morning of October 12, 1959, appellant’s bus which was being operated in a westerly direction on Sunset Boulevard by a student bus driver under the instruction oí one Hartsfield, appellant’s regular bus driver, approached to about 10 feet to the rear of the truck where it stopped facing west in the lane next to the esplanade which separates traffic moving in an easterly direction on Sunset Boulevard from traffic moving in a westerly direction thereon. Appellee, who had been picking up and placing on the truck branches which an accompanying city employee had cut, and who was standing on the left side of the truck with his back thereto, motioned the bus to pass. Thereupon the driver of the bus started the bus, driving the same at about 5 miles per hour between the north curb of the esplanade, and the parked truck. After about 20 feet of the bus had passed appellee without incident he was pinned between the right side of the bus and the flat bed of the truck, and received serious injuries.

The jury found in answer to Special Issues Nos. 3, 4 and 5 that while passing the parked truck on the occasion in question the operator of the bus changed the course and direction of the bus without first ascertaining that such movement could be made in safety, and that such movement was negligence, and that such negligence was a proximate cause of the occurrence made the basis of the suit. To Special Issue No. 6 the jury found that while passing the parked truck on the occasion in question the operator of the bus did not turn the bus to the right when such would not have been done by a reasonably prudent person. Having thus answered Special Issue No. 6, the jury did not answer Special Issue No. 7 inquiring as to whether the act of turning was a proximate cause of the occurrence in question. Appellant complains that the court erred in permitting appellee a double submission of the same theory of recovery of liability inasmuch as Special Issues Nos. 3,4 and 5 submit the same theory of liability as Special Issues Nos. 6 and 7, and also that the court erred in entering judgment on the verdict because of a fatal conflict in the answers to said two sets of issues.

The evidence shows that there was ample space between the north curb of the esplanade and the truck for the bus to have passed without striking appellee who was standing with his back to the truck and facing the passing bus, had the latter proceeded straight ahead with its left wheels in close proximity to the esplanade curb. Since some 20 feet of the bus, which was approximately 34 feet long, safely passed appellee, it seems evident that the collision between the side of the bus and appellee occurred as a result of the bus driver turning the bus to the right while passing the parked truck, or as a result of the bus being driven at an angle away from the esplanade and toward the north curb of Sunset Boulevard, thus in either case narrowing the space between the bus and the truck. The jury did not find that there was no turn to the right by the bus at any time while passing, but that there was no turn [187]*187to the right at a time when a prudent person would not have turned the bus to the right. The jury found, however, that the operator of the bus did change the course and direction of the bus while passing the truck, without first ascertaining that such movement could be made in safety.

It is our view that a careful analysis of the two sets of issues will disclose that they are not making an identical inquiry of the jury, and that there is no factual duplicity or undue emphasis resulting from such submission. Appellant asserts in its brief that the evidence, even taken in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, shows only a gradual movement of the bus to the right. If we assume the correctness of such statement, although there is evidence to the contrary, it is not believed that the jurors were so misled by the inquiries made in Special Issues Nos. 6 and 7 as to prompt them to affirmatively answer Special Issues 3, 4 and 5 as they did. It seems probable that the jury found that there was a movement of the bus to the right, and that such movement constituted a change in the course and direction of the bus that was negligence, rather than the mere turn to the right inquired about in Special Issue No. 6.

We are also of the opinion that appellee was entitled to a statutory submission of its theory of the case as well as a common law submission, even though the two sets of issues are somewhat similar. In Texas & N. O. R. Co. v. Day, 159 Tex. 101, 316 S.W.2d 402, 408, the court made the following statement: “Obviously, petitioner has not had a proper submission of its defenses under Article 6701d. Submission of petitioner’s common-law defense of failure of the truck operator to keep a proper lookout did not satisfy the requirements for submission of the statutory defenses.”

Special Issue No. 6 is a common-law submission of negligence on the part of the operator of the bus in turning the bus to the right when a reasonably prudent person would not have done so. Special Issue No. 3, on the other hand, is a statutory submission. Section 68(a), Article 6701d, Vernon’s Ann.Tex.St., provides, among other things, that no person shall turn a vehicle from a direct course or move right or left upon a roadway unless and until such movement can be made with safety. The two issues are not mutually coextensive. In order to answer Special Issue No. 3 as it did, the jury had to find that the operator of the bus changed its course and direction without first ascertaining that such movement could be made in safety, whereas Special Issue No. 6 merely inquires as to whether the operator turned the bus to the right when it would not have been done by a reasonably prudent person. The jury probably was of the opinion, as shown by its answers, that the driver made the change in the course and direction of the bus without first ascertaining that it could be done in safety, and that such conduct was negligence, whereas the mere turn of the bus to the right at some time while passing the truck, was not negligence. In other words, the turn in itself was not the result of negligence but the change in course and direction without first ascertaining that such change in the course and direction of the bus could be made in safety, did constitute negligence.

With respect to plaintiff being entitled to a common-law and a statutory submission even though the two sets of issues are substantially similar, see also Lubbock Bus Co. v. Pearson, Tex.Civ.App.1953, 266 S.W.2d 439, writ ref., n. r. e.; Dallas Railway & Terminal Company v. Black, 1953, 152 Tex. 343, 257 S.W.2d 416, 421; Airline Motor Coaches v. Guidry, Tex.Civ.App., 241 S.W.2d 203

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403 S.W.2d 184, 1966 Tex. App. LEXIS 3035, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/houston-transit-co-v-farrack-texapp-1966.