Roberts v. Estate of Randall

2002 WY 115, 51 P.3d 204, 2002 Wyo. LEXIS 121, 2002 WL 1729896
CourtWyoming Supreme Court
DecidedJuly 26, 2002
Docket00-77
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 2002 WY 115 (Roberts v. Estate of Randall) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Wyoming Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Roberts v. Estate of Randall, 2002 WY 115, 51 P.3d 204, 2002 Wyo. LEXIS 121, 2002 WL 1729896 (Wyo. 2002).

Opinions

GOLDEN, Justice.

[¶ 1] This appeal primarily presents the issue whether a jury properly considered violations of certain motor vehicle statutes as evidence of negligence by persons operating [206]*206snowmobiles. After the snowmobiles operated by Appellant Robert H. Roberts and Steven Charles Randall collided, killing Randall and partially paralyzing Roberts, Roberts and his wife Cinta (the Robertses) brought suit against Randall’s estate (Estate). At trial, the district court instructed the jury that various statutes from Wyo. Stat. Ann. §§ 31-5-101 through 31-5-1507, Wyoming’s Uniform Act Regulating Traffic on Highways (Chapter Five), were applicable in determining the negligence, if any, of the two snowmobile operators. The jury returned a verdict finding that Roberts was seventy-four percent at fault and Randall was twenty-six percent at fault. The Robertses contend that motor vehicle statutes are not applicable to snowmobile operation and the jury instructions constituted errors entitling them to a new trial. The Robertses also contend that they were entitled to a jury instruction on the sudden emergency doctrine and the trial court’s refusal to provide that instruction was error.

[¶ 2] We hold that Wyo. Stat. Ann. §§ 31-5-101 through 1507 (Chapter Five) do apply, and the district court’s jury instructions properly instructed on the applicable law. We hold that the sudden emergency doctrine survived enactment of the comparative negligence statutes but did not apply based on the evidence. We affirm the order of judgment on the verdict.

ISSUES

[¶ 3] The Robertses presents these issues for our review:

A. The trial court improperly instructed the jury regarding the use of vehicles on Wyoming highways in a case involving snowmobiles being operated on a snowmobile trail.
B. The trial court failed to instruct the jury on the sudden emergency doctrine in the face of its decision to instruct the jury regarding the application of Wyoming statutes.
C. The trial court failed to instruct the jury on Appellants’ “theory of the case” and “concurrent cause,” and then proceeded to give an inference of negligence instruction based upon Appellee’s assertions that Appellants violated the Motor Vehicle Regulations, while continuing to refuse to instruct the jury on sudden emergency which would have justified Appellants’ conduct even if such conduct violated the Motor Vehicle Regulations.
D.The trial court abused its discretion when it refused to grant Appellants’ motion for new trial or in the alternative, refused to amend the jury’s apportionment of fault to reflect that the Appellant was not negligent as a matter of law.

The Estate states that the issues are:

1. Whether this Court lacks jurisdiction due to an untimely filing of a notice of appeal by the Appellants?
2. Whether the trial court properly denied Appellants’ “Motion for a New Trial, for Judgment as a Matter of Law, or, in the Alternative for Amendment of the Jury Verdict”?
3. Whether the trial court properly refused to give the Appellants’ theory of the case instruction?
4. Whether the trial court properly refused to give the Appellants’ concurrent cause instruction?

FACTS

[¶ 4] The Greys River area on the Wyoming Range in western Wyoming is a popular recreational area. Greys River Road in the Bridger-Teton National Forest is a national forest service road (No. 10138) that is accessible for wheeled traffic in the summer but closed to that traffic during winter. Although Greys River Road is not plowed during winter, it is groomed for a snowmobile trail and frequently used by snowmobilers.

[¶ 5] On February 7, 1998, two different parties of snowmobilers departed east from Alpine, Wyoming, to snowmobile on Greys River Road. The Randall party, a group of five men, left Alpine about ten o’clock that morning and began returning towards Alpine that afternoon. The Roberts party left Alpine later that day and traveled away from Alpine. The Roberts party included Roberts, his wife and their two children, and Shane Brown, Brown’s wife and Brown’s two [207]*207children. Each person had his or her own snowmobile. Roberts cautioned everyone in his party that because they were getting a late start, other riders would be coming out, and because the weather was not ideal, other riders would not be expecting people coming up the trail that late in the day. The wives and children departed first, and Roberts and Brown followed them up the trail.

[¶ 6] Soon, however, Roberts and Brown took the lead and raced each other. At the time of the accident, Randall and Roberts were traveling towards each other. Roberts was closely following Brown, who was positioned to the right of the trail. Roberts testified that he was positioned fifty feet' behind and to the left of Brown’s snowmobile because it was spraying snow in a roostertail behind it. Brown testified that at the crest of a hill an oncoming Randall passed dangerously close to him. Roberts testified that he saw Randall on Roberts’ side of the trail and Roberts swerved to his own left; however, Randall also veered in that direction, and the two snowmobiles collided. Each was thrown off, and the two collided in mid-air. Randall was killed; Roberts was seriously injured.

[¶ 7] The trial focused on disputed evidence of each snowmobile’s position immediately before the collision with each claiming that the other had not safely stayed to the right of the center of the trail. Roberts claimed that although he was close to the trail’s center, he was proceeding to his right of the trail’s center until Randall’s position left of center forced him to swerve left. He explained that he moved left instead of right because he had just noted on his right a steep drop-off down an embankment to a river. The Estate claimed that Roberts was left of center the entire time despite cresting a hill and this position caused him to collide with Randall. Evidence at trial established that an ungroomed turnout was immediately to Roberts’ right, but Roberts failed to see it.

[¶ 8] At trial, jury instructions numbered twelve and thirteen instructed the jury that every person operating a vehicle upon a roadway should do so with reasonable control and while keeping a proper lookout for other persons using the roadway. Instruction number fourteen advised that violation of a statute is evidence of negligence. The jury was then instructed based upon Chapter Five. In this regard, instructions numbered fifteen through eighteen stated:

Jury Instruction No. 15

YOU ARE INSTRUCTED that Wyoming Statute § 31-5-202[1] provides that: “Drivers of vehicles proceeding in oppose [sic] directions shall pass each other to the right and upon roadways having width for not more than one (1) line of traffic in each direction each driver shall give to the other at lease [sic] one-half (1/2) of the main-traveled portion of the roadway as nearly as possible.”

Jury Instruction No. 16
YOU ARE INSTRUCTED that Wyoming Statute § 31-5-205[2] provides in part that no vehicle shall be driven on the left side of the roadway when approaching or upon the crest of a grade or a curve in the [208]

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
2002 WY 115, 51 P.3d 204, 2002 Wyo. LEXIS 121, 2002 WL 1729896, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/roberts-v-estate-of-randall-wyo-2002.