Kile v. Kile

1936 OK 748, 63 P.2d 753, 178 Okla. 576, 1936 Okla. LEXIS 895
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedDecember 1, 1936
DocketNo. 26940.
StatusPublished
Cited by11 cases

This text of 1936 OK 748 (Kile v. Kile) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kile v. Kile, 1936 OK 748, 63 P.2d 753, 178 Okla. 576, 1936 Okla. LEXIS 895 (Okla. 1936).

Opinion

PER CURIAM.

This is an appeal from a judgment of the district court of Payne county. The parties occupy the same positions here as in the trial court and will be referred to as plaintiff and defendant. The action was brought to recover damages for personal injuries alleged to have been sustained as the result of an automobile.accident occurring while the plaintiff was a guest in a ear owned and driven by Eugene Kile, Sr. The accident happened in Colorado, and plaintiff and defendant both pleaded and relied upon the laws of that state as controlling their rights and liabilities in this action. A jury was impaneled to try the case, but at the close of plaintiff’s evidence defendant interposed a demurrer thereto, which was sustained and the cause withdrawn from the jury and judgment rendered for the defendant. Motion for new trial was duly filed, heard, and overruled. Defendant, Eugene Kile, Sr., departed this life, and the cause was revived against Eugene Kile, Jr., administrator of his estate and the husband of the plaintiff. Plaintiff assigns in this court four specifications of error, which are presented under the following propositions:

“1. The court erred in refusing to permit the plaintiff to introduce evidence that was competent and material.
“2. The court erred in sustaining the defendant’s demurrer to the plaintiff’s evidence and in taking the ease away from the jury and rendering judgment for the defendant.
“3. The court erred in rendering a judgment for the defendant, when the jury had never returned a verdict for the defendant.
“4. The court erred in overruling the plaintiff’s motion for new trial.”

Plaintiff’s first proposition is based upon the refusal of the court to permit a witness to testify to a certain statement alleged to have been made by the defendant, Eugene Kile, Sr., to the witness. The witness, in an affidavit which was attached to the motion for new trial, said that had he been permitted to do so he would have testified as follows:

“Eugene Kile, Sr., told me that it was his own fault that the collision occurred between his car and that of Clyde Spellman because he was coasting down grade with his own car in free wheeling and was going too fast to stop in time to avoid a collision.”

This witness while on the stand was permitted to and did testify to substantially the same statement. Had the witness been permitted to testify in the above particulars, his testimony would have merely been cumulative, so that if the rejection of this evidence was improper, which question we do not determine, it would at most constitute harmless _ error under the record here presented, and therefore will be disregarded. Section 3206, O. S. 1931, and Colvert v. Foster, 104 Okla. 196, 230 P. 879. Plaintiff’s second proposition presents the vital question involved in this appeal. The plaintiff pleaded and relied upon the following provisions of section 97, chap. 122, S. L. 1931, Colo., which read as follows:

“The driver of a motor vehicle when traveling upon a down grade upon any highway shall not coast with the gears of such vehicle in neutral.”

And section 73, chap. 122, S. L. 1931. Colo., which reads as follows:

“Section 73 (a). Any person driving a vehicle upon the highway shall drive the same at a careful and prudent speed not greater or less than is reasonable and proper, having due regard to the traffic, surface and width of the highway, the weather conditions and the condition of the vehicle he is then operating, and of any other conditions then existing. No person shall drive any vehicle upon the highway at such speed as to endanger the life, limb or property of any person, nor at such speed as to prevent him from retaining complete control of said vehicle so as to be able to slow or stop the same in order to avoid a collision with any other vehicle then within range of his vision.”

The defendant pleaded section 138422 *578 Oolo. Comp. Laws, Supl. of 1932, page 131 (Laws Colo., 1931, c. 118, sec. 1), which reads as follows:

“Guest of owner shall not have cause of action for damages — Public carriers excepted. No person transported by the owner or operator of a motor vehicle as his guest, without payment for such transportation, shall have a cause of action for damages against such owner or operator for injury, death or loss in case of accident, unless such accident shall have been intentional on the part of such owner or operator, or caused by his intoxication, or by negligence consisting of a willful and wanton disregard of the rights of others. The provisions of this section shall not relieve a public carrier or any owner or operator of a motor vehicle, while the same is being demonstrated to a prospective purchaser, of responsibility for any injuries sustained by a passenger being transported by such public carrier or by such owner or operator.”

Plaintiff sought recovery on the theory of “negligence consisting of a willful and wanton disregard of the rights of others.” The evidence offered was in substance to the effect that on the 12th day of August, 1933, the plaintiff and her father-in-law, Eugene Kile, Sr., and her husband, Eugene Kile, Jr., were traveling in an automobile from Denver to Colorado Springs ; that Eugene Kile, Sr., was driving, using free wheeling, and was going very fast, the testimony being that he was traveling at around 60 miles an hour; that the road was over mountainous country; that the car was traveling south and was on the wrong side of the road at the time the accident happened ; that plaintiff had protested against the speed at which they were traveling several times prior to the happening of the accident; that plaintiff was hurt in the accident; was under the care of a physician, confined in a hospital 11 days and had to stay in the home of a friend for approximately a year and had been compelled to go back to the hospital twice since the accident as a result of her injuries, and that immediately after the accident the defendant had said that he was driving too fast and should not have been in free wheeling and did not have as good' control of his car as he thought he had; that he subsequently made substantially the same statement after his return to Oklahoma. It will be observed from what has been said that (he proof of plaintiff was clearly sufficient to establish a violation by the defendant of both sections of the Colorado Statute pleaded by the p’ain-tiff, and that this would constitute negligence per se and is sustained by the weight of authority. The plaintiff, however, in order to recover by reason of the so-called guest statute, had to prove negligence consisting of a willful and wanton disregard of the rights of others. The plaintiff insists that her proof was sufficient to establish such negligence, and in this connection calls our attention to Spencer v. Holt, 82 Okla. 280, 200 P. 187; Tully v. Wetzel, 97 Okla. 24, 222 P. 539; Kastel v. Steiber (Cal.) 8 P. (2d) 477; Kellner v. Witte (Cal. App.) 23 P. (2d) 1045; Wiley v. Green Cab Co. (Ohio App.) 179 N. E. 419; Schlesinger v. Miller (Colo.) 52 P. (2d) 402; Foster v. Redding, (Colo.) 45 P. (2d) 940; Victor Coal Co. v. Muir (Colo.) 38 P. (2d) 1385, Brickey v. Herring (Colo.) 41 P. (2d) 298; Janeskie v. Kaib (Colo.) 230 P. 392; Miller v. Price, 168 Ok’a. 452, 33 P. (2d) 624; Strough v. Central Ry. Co., 209 Fed. 23; Barcroft v. Adkins (Cal.

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Bluebook (online)
1936 OK 748, 63 P.2d 753, 178 Okla. 576, 1936 Okla. LEXIS 895, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kile-v-kile-okla-1936.