Nash-Wilson Funeral Home, Inc. v. Greer

417 S.W.2d 562, 57 Tenn. App. 191, 1966 Tenn. App. LEXIS 204
CourtCourt of Appeals of Tennessee
DecidedOctober 10, 1966
StatusPublished
Cited by11 cases

This text of 417 S.W.2d 562 (Nash-Wilson Funeral Home, Inc. v. Greer) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Tennessee primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Nash-Wilson Funeral Home, Inc. v. Greer, 417 S.W.2d 562, 57 Tenn. App. 191, 1966 Tenn. App. LEXIS 204 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1966).

Opinion

COOPER, J.

These suits arose out of an ambulance-automobile collision which occurred on October 11, 1965, in. the intersection of Center Street and Lamont Street in Kingsport, Tennessee. The plaintiffs, Louise Greer and her husband Ralph E. Greer, were passengers in the ambulance of the defendant, Nash-Wilson Funeral Home. The automobile involved in the accident was owned and operated by the defendant Hazel B. Couch.

Mrs. Greer filed suit in the Circuit Court of Hawkins County, Tennessee, in an effort to recover damages for personal injuries she received in the accident. Her husband, who was not injured in the accident, filed suit to recover damages for the loss of his wife’s services and consortium, and to recover expenses incurred in treating her injuries.

The cases were consolidated for trial, at the conclusion of which the jury returned verdicts for both plaintiffs and against both defendants — Louise Greer being awarded $15,000 and Ralph Greer being awarded $2,500.00.

On appeal, each defendant insists that there is no evidence to sustain the jury’s verdict against them.

In reviewing a case on appeal, where the appeal is from a judgment based on a jury’s verdict, “it [our review] must be governed by the rule, safeguarding the constitutional right of trial by jury, which requires us to take the strongest legitimate view of all the evidence to uphold the verdict, to assume the truth of all that tends to support it, to discard all to the contrary, and to allow all reasonable inferences to sustain the verdict.” D. M. Rose & Co. v. Snyder, 185 Tenn. 499, 206 S.W.2d 897. And [196]*196if' there is material evidence to support' the verdict it must be affirmed. City of Chattanooga v. Ballew, 49 Tenn.App. 310, 354 S.W.2d 806.

When so reviewed, the record shows that Mrs. G-reer, acting on the advice of her husband’s physician, called for an ambulance of the defendant Nash-Wilson Funeral Home to take her husband to the Veterans Hospital in Johnson City, some sixty miles from their home in Rogersville. The ambulance was driven by one Andrew Peavler. On reaching Kingsport, Tennessee, and while travelling* east on Center Street, Peavler ran a red light at the intersection of Center and Lamont Streets. The defendant Hazel B. Couch was crossing Center at Lamont, going south, she having a green light at the time. The vehicles collided underneath the signal light near the center of the intersection. .

The several witnesses who saw the accident gave varying estimates as to the speed of the ambulance as it approached the intersection where the accident occurred —the estimates of speed ranging from 20-25 miles per hour to 40-45 miles per hour. All witnesses agreed that the red flashing light on the ambulance was working, and the majority testified that the ambulance siren was sounding. One witness testified, however, that the siren did not sound during the last 150 feet before the ambulance entered the intei'section.

Mr. Peavler testified that he saw the automobile driven by Miss Couch in time to have stopped the ambulance but did not do so, thinking that she would stop or alter her speed to let the ambulance pass.

Other witnesses testified that it was apparent that a collision would occur if both the ambulance and the auto[197]*197mobile of Miss Couch continued into the intersection at the same rate of speed.

Miss Couch testified that she knew that she had the green light and did not look either to her left or to her right as she entered the intersection. She further testified that she did not hear the ambulance approach, and did not see it until her automobile struck the side of the ambulance.

The record further shows that the Nash-Wilson ambulance had not been designated or authorized as an emergency vehicle “by the commissioner or the chief of police of an incorporated city.” T.C.A. sec. 59-801. Not being so designated or authorized, the driver of the ambulance was not entitled to the privileges and exemptions from the requirements of designated traffic regulations (T.C.A. sec. 59-808, T.C.A. sec. 59-832), but was required to obey all statutes controlling the operation of motor vehicles generally, as well as exercise due care in the operation of his vehicle, and the trial court should have so instructed the jury.

Under the undisputed proof, the statutory right-of-way in the intersection of Lamont and Center Streets belonged to Miss Couch, she having entered a controlled intersection of the green light. T.C.A. sec. 59-810.

However, the fact that Miss Couch had the right of way does not, of necessity, require or justify a verdict be directed in her behalf. In our opinion, the question of who had the right of way is not the sole determinative issue in the-present case, though it is a very important factor in a finding of liability in any intersection accident. The mere fact that one vehicle has. the right of way over another at a street intersection does [198]*198not relieve the driver thus favored from the duty of exercising due care not to injure others at the street intersection. See Duling v. Burnett, 22 Tenn.App. 522, 534, 124 S.W.2d 294; Shew v. Bailey, 37 Tenn.App. 40, 260 S.W.2d 362. And, in our opinion, when the above evidence is considered in the light most favorable to the plaintiff as wé are required to do, there is material evidence in the record from which twelve reasonable men— acting under proper instructions from the court — could find that both drivers failed to “exercise due care”, regardless of who had the right of way, and that the negligence of both drivers combined and concurred together to proximately cause the accident.

Specifically, we think a jury reasonably could find that the driver of the ambulance entered a busy downtown intersection against a red light at an excessive rate of speed and without sounding its siren. Further, we think the jury could find that the ambulance driver did not have the ambulance under reasonable control and failed to act as a reasonably prudent person would act after he saw Miss Couch’s automobile and realized that an accident was imminent if either he or Miss Couch did not alter the speed or change the course of their vehicle. The negligence of Miss Couch would be her failure to see the approaching ambulance until after the collision — it being a basic requirement of due care in the operation of an automobile that the driver keep a reasonably careful lookout for traffic upon the highway “commensurate with the dangerous character of the vehicle and the nature of the locality” (Hale v. Rayburn, 37 Tenn.App. 413, 264 S.W.2d 230), “and to see all that comes within the radius of his line of vision, both in front and to the side.” Hadley v. Morris, 35 Tenn.App. 534, 249 S.W.2d 295, 298.

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Bluebook (online)
417 S.W.2d 562, 57 Tenn. App. 191, 1966 Tenn. App. LEXIS 204, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/nash-wilson-funeral-home-inc-v-greer-tennctapp-1966.