Jackson v. Gulf Insurance Co.

188 So. 2d 84, 1966 La. App. LEXIS 4980
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedJune 6, 1966
DocketNo. 2097
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 188 So. 2d 84 (Jackson v. Gulf Insurance 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
Jackson v. Gulf Insurance Co., 188 So. 2d 84, 1966 La. App. LEXIS 4980 (La. Ct. App. 1966).

Opinion

SAMUEL, Judge.

This suit for personal injuries and medical expenses arises out of an automobile-truck collision. Plaintiffs are Lloyd Jackson, Sr., Mrs. Kathleen Lee, Mrs. Lena Porea, and the husbands of Kathleen Lee .and Lena Porea, Joseph Lee and Oscar Porea. There are two defendants, Gulf Insurance Company, the automobile driver’s liability insurer, and Maryland Casualty 'Company, liability insurer of the truck. The trial court judgment was in favor of iboth defendants and dismissed the suit as to. all plaintiffs. All plaintiffs have appealed therefrom.

The accident happened during the early afternoon of a clear day a short distance north of Lockport on Louisiana Highway 308. At the point where the collision oc■curred the highway was a straight, two-lane, blacktopped road. The injured plaintiffs were in an automobile owned by one ■of them, Lloyd Jackson, Sr., and being ■driven by his son, Lloyd Jackson, Jr. Lloyd Jackson, Sr. occupied the front seat next to the door, Kathleen Lee was sitting on the front seat between Jackson, Sr. and the driver, and Lena Porea was on the back seat.

Generally (we will discuss the testimony given by the injured plaintiffs in more detail later in this opinion), the plaintiff passengers and their driver testified the automobile was being operated in a proper manner, at a proper speed and on its proper side of the highway when the truck, which was approaching from the opposite direction, suddenly pulled across the center of the liighway and struck their vehicle, the collision taking place in the automobile’s correct lane of travel.

The other vehicle involved in the accident was a pickup truck owned by the operators of a store in Lockport. The truck’s occupants, an adult driver and two boys, were engaged in delivering advertising circulars. One of the boys was injured .and did not remember some of the details •of the accident. But the combined testimony of the driver and the other boy is to the effect that the truck had been driven about halfway off the highway on its extreme right and stopped in order to pick up some circulars which had blown off the truck; that one of the boys was standing in the bed of the truck and the other was passing circulars to him, when the plaintiff automobile drove across the center line, and across the road, and struck the truck; that the collision took place at or near the edge of the highway in the truck’s lane of travel and occurred after the truck had been stopped for several minutes. The record contains other testimony showing that after the collision there were skid or tire marks running from the automobile’s side of the road across the center of the highway to the impact point on the truck’s side of the road.

The trial court concluded the driver of the truck was not guilty of negligence and on that ground dismissed the suit against the truck’s insurer, Maryland Casualty Company. The suit was dismissed as to the other defendant, Gulf Insurance Company, the insurer of the plaintiff automobile driver, on the ground that the testimony of each of the three plaintiff passengers completely and unequivocally exonerated that driver from negligence and therefore operated as a judicial confession under LSA-C.C. Art. 2291, precluding a recovery by the plaintiffs against Gulf.

In this court appellants do not contest the trial court’s finding of no negligence on the part of the truck driver and concede that on the basis of that finding their suit against Maryland was dismissed properly. But appellants contend they are entitled to recover against the other defendant, Gulf, because: (1) the rule relative to judicial confessions under LSA-C.C. Art. 2291, relied on by the trial court as to Gulf, is not applicable in tort suits; and alternatively, (2) even if the rule and codal article do apply in tort cases, plaintiffs are entitled to recover against Gulf because the testimony of the plaintiff passengers did [86]*86not completely and unequivocally exonerate the driver of the plaintiff automobile.

Civil Code Article 2291 provides:

“The judicial confession is the declaration which the party, or his special attorney in fact, makes in a judicial proceeding.
It amounts to full proof against him who has made it.
It can not be divided against him.
It can not be revoked, unless it be proved to have been made through an error in fact.
It can not be revoked on a pretense of an error in law.” LSA-C.C. Art. 2291.

The above quoted Article 2291 first was applied to plaintiff testimonial recitations of facts in tort cases by this court in Thompson v. Haubtman, 18 La.App. 119, 137 So. 362 (1931). Since 1931 the rule thus established, that where the testimony of a passenger completely and unequivocally exonerates his driver from negligence, such testimony operates as a judicial confession under LSA-C.C. Art. 2291 and precludes a recovery by the testifying passenger against that driver, has been applied consistently in many Louisiana Courts of Appeal tort cases, either by denying a recovery on the basis of a judicial confession under the article, or by a recognition of the applicability of the article with a finding that the testimony involved did not completely and unequivocally exonerate the host driver. See Steiner v. Employers Liability Assurance Corp., 182 So.2d 345 (3d Cir. La.App.1966); Matchum v. Allstate Insurance Company, 180 So.2d 767 (1st Cir. La.App.1965); Reynolds v. Hardware Mutual Casualty Company, 178 So.2d 412 (1st Cir. La.App.1965); Hebert v. Aetna Casualty and Surety Company, 172 So.2d 121 (1st Cir. La.App.1965); Franklin v. Zurich Insurance Company, 136 So.2d 735 (1st Cir. La.App.1962); Stroud v. Standard Accident Insurance Co., 90 So.2d 477 (2d Cir. La.App.1956).

We note that certiorari was granted in Reynolds v. Hardware Mutual Casualty Company, supra, and the Supreme Court of Louisiana recently handed down its opinion and decree in that case, (the Supreme Court of Louisiana, 186 So.2d 588, handed down on May 2, 1966). However, while the Supreme Court opinion states certiorari was granted because the court entertained a serious doubt that C.C. Art. 2291 applied to testimonial recitations of facts and further entertained doubt that the Court of Appeal conclusion in the case was correctjn view of the fourth paragraph of the article which would seem to permit a consideration of all the’ evidence and a rendering of judgment according to the true facts, the court expressly did not pass thereon. Instead, the Court found the plaintiff’s testimony, taken as a whole, did not completely exonerate her host driver and held that such a finding made it unnecessary to pass on those issues.

In view of the extensive Court of Appeal jurisprudence, now sufficient, we believe, so as to require that any change therein be made by the Supreme Court or by the legislature, as well as of the fact that we agree with the rule first established by this court in 1931, we hold the rule and the-codal article are applicable in tort cases- and in the instant case. We therefore proceed to an examination of the testimony-given by each plaintiff passenger.

The testimony of the two plaintiffs in. the front seat of the Jackson car, Lloyd Jackson, Sr. and Kathleen Lee, is similar.

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Related

Jackson v. Gulf Insurance Company
199 So. 2d 886 (Supreme Court of Louisiana, 1967)
Jackson v. Gulf Insurance
191 So. 2d 144 (Supreme Court of Louisiana, 1966)

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Bluebook (online)
188 So. 2d 84, 1966 La. App. LEXIS 4980, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/jackson-v-gulf-insurance-co-lactapp-1966.