Ingersoll v. Mason

155 F. Supp. 497, 1957 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2965
CourtDistrict Court, W.D. Arkansas
DecidedAugust 21, 1957
DocketCiv. A. No. 624
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 155 F. Supp. 497 (Ingersoll v. Mason) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, W.D. Arkansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ingersoll v. Mason, 155 F. Supp. 497, 1957 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2965 (W.D. Ark. 1957).

Opinion

LEMLEY, Chief Judge.

This personal injury action, which was submitted to the jury on interrogatories pursuant to Rule 49(a), Fed.Rules Civ. Proc., 28 U.S.C.A., is now before the Court upon certain post-trial motions filed by the respective parties after the jury returned its answers to the interrogatories propounded to it. Upon the jury’s answers being read in open court, it was at once apparent that they raised certain legal questions as to the ultimate rights of the parties, and the Court prior to attempting to render judgment requested counsel on both sides to file motions for the entry of what each considered to be an appropriate judgment, and to accompany their motions with memorandum briefs, with each side being given an opportunity to file a reply brief. Such motions have now been filed and briefed, and the case is ready for final disposition.1

The accident out of which this litigation arose took place about 4:25 P.M. on December 26, 1954 at a point on U. S. Highway No. 67 a short distance north of the City of Prescott, Nevada County, Arkansas, and opposite a salvage yard located on the east side of the highway operated by the plaintiff. Immediately prior to the accident the plaintiff, a citizen of Arkansas, accompanied by his father, O. T. Ingersoll, had been proceeding in plaintiff’s pick-up truck south along the highway, and as they approached the salvage yard, the plaintiff undertook to make a left-hand turn across the highway to enter a driveway leading to his place of business. At the same time the defendants, James Mason and Martha Mason, his wife, and her niece, the intervenor, Frankie Lene Rachal, all citizens of Illinois, were proceeding north along the highway in a 1954 model Dodge automobile being operated by James Mason, and the collision occurred before the plaintiff had completed his turning movement.

It was the theory of the plaintiff that he was operating his pick-up truck with ordinary care, that he had commenced his turning movement and had crossed the northbound traffic lane, and had gone onto the east shoulder of the highway and was proceeding south along the shoulder preparatory to turning into the driveway when the Mason car came around a curve at an excessive rate of speed, ran off of the main traveled portion of the highway and onto the shoulder and struck his pick-up truck. He charged that the driver of the Mason car was guilty of negligence in failing to keep a proper lookout, in driving at an excessive rate of speed, and in failing to maintain proper control. He further alleged that the car was jointly owned by James and Martha Mason, and that the latter was driving under the supervision of her husband, that they were engaged on a joint enterprise, and that the alleged negligence of Martha Mason was imputed to her husband. At the commencement of the trial, however, the plaintiff conceded that the car was being operated by James Mason, but he insisted upon his contentions that the car was [501]*501jointly owned by the Masons and that they were on a joint enterprise so that the alleged negligence of the driver ■would be imputed to his wife, and he .advanced the further contention that .James Mason was operating the car as .his-wife’s agent.

In their pleadings and throughout the trial, the Masons consistently took the position that the car was being operated by James Mason; and they denied that .'he was guilty of any negligence, or that his negligence was imputed to Martha Mason upon any theory of joint enterprise or agency. By way of counterclaim the Masons asserted that their alleged .injuries and damage were proximately caused by the negligence of the plaintiff in undertaking to make a left-hand turn when it was not safe to do so and without giving a proper turning signal, and in operating his pick-up truck while intoxicated. In that connection they contended that as the Mason car approached the Ingersoll pick-up truck which was obscured from their view by another vehicle proceeding ahead of him in the same direction, he suddenly and without warning turned his vehicle across the center line of the highway directly into the path of the Mason car, and that the collision occurred, not on the shoulder of the road, but in their portion of the paved surface of the highway. In their ■counterclaim they asked for compensatory damages and also prayed for punitive damages on the theory that the alleged negligence of Ingersoll was willful and wanton. The intervenor, Frankie Lene Rachal, adopted the allegations of the counterclaim and likewise .sought both compensatory and punitive damages. By appropriate responsive pleadings addressed to the counterclaim and intervention the plaintiff denied that any of his adversaries was entitled to any recovery whatever.

After the evidence had been concluded and after the case had been argued, the case was submitted to the jury upon six interrogatories, which, together with the jury’s answers thereto, are set forth in Appendix “A” to this opinion. As will be noted from its answers to the interrogatories, the jury found that both the plaintiff and James Mason were guilty of negligence which proximately caused or contributed to the accident, that the Mason car was owned exclusively by James Mason, but that Martha Mason had with him an equal right of control with respect to the operation thereof, that all of the parties had sustained actual damages, and that Martha Mason was “entitled to an award” of punitive damages in the sum of $5,000.2

As is usual in cases of this kind, the evidence as to how the accident occurred and as to who was to blame was sharply conflicting, and we are satisfied that the jury’s findings that the accident was proximately caused by the joint and concurrent negligence of the plaintiff and of James Mason were amply supported by the evidence. As a matter of fact, neither side appears to quarrel seriously with those findings; nor does either side question the amounts of actual damages found by the jury, which amounts were conservative, or the amount of punitive damages found with respect to Martha Mason, although the plaintiff does urgently contend that the finding of such damages has no substantial evidentiary basis.

In his motion the plaintiff takes the position that the contributory negligence of James Mason bars him from recovery herein,3 and further that such [502]*502negligence on his part was imputed to his wife on the theories of joint enterprise and agency which have been mentioned, and bars her from any recovery of either actual or punitive damages. In addition to the foregoing, the plaintiff now advances for the first time the contention that Martha Mason was herself guilty of independent contributory negligence in failing to keep a lookout and in failing to cause the Mason car to be so operated as to avoid the collision. The plaintiff does not ask for any affirmative judgment in his favor, nor does he challenge the right of Frankie Lene Kachal to have judgment for the small amount of actual damage found to have been sustained by her; he simply asks that the counterclaim of the Masons be dismissed in its entirety.4

In their motion for judgment the counterclaimants and intervenor pray that judgment be entered for them for the compensatory damages found by the jury, and that Martha Mason have judgment in addition for the punitive damages so found.

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155 F. Supp. 497, 1957 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2965, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ingersoll-v-mason-arwd-1957.