Sunset Motor Lines v. Blasingame

245 S.W.2d 288, 1951 Tex. App. LEXIS 1879
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJuly 20, 1951
Docket14392
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 245 S.W.2d 288 (Sunset Motor Lines v. Blasingame) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Sunset Motor Lines v. Blasingame, 245 S.W.2d 288, 1951 Tex. App. LEXIS 1879 (Tex. Ct. App. 1951).

Opinions

CRAMER, Justice.

Appellee Blasingame filed this suit against appellant Sunset Motor Lines to recover damages alleged to have proximately resulted from the negligence of appellant in a collision when its tractor-trailer collided with his dump truck. On the trial the jury, on special issues, found: (1). Appellant’s freight truck prior to the collision was being driven on its left side of the road, (2) which was negligence, and (3) proximate cause of the collision; (7) appellant’s driver failed to keep a proper lookout, (8) proximately causing the collision; (9) failed to apply his brakes, (10) which was negligence, (11) proximately causing the collision; (12) failed to reduce the speed of the truck, (13) which was negligence, (14) proximately causing the collision; (15) immediately prior to the collision appellee’s dump truck was in a perilous position, (16) which was discovered and realized by appellant’s driver, (17) in time to have, in the exercise of ordinary care and the use of all means at hand, avoided the collision with safety to his truck and himself; (18) after such discovery and realization he failed to exercise ordinary care in the use of all means at his command consistent with his and his truck’s safety to have avoided the plaintiff’s damage, (19) which failure was a proximate cause of the damage to appel-lee’s truck; (20-21) found the damages to appellee’s truck to be $890; (22) appellee’s driver was not driving his dump truck immediately before the collision on ¡his left side of the road; (25) did not drive his truck on the left side of the road and then cut back to the right side into appellant’s truck; (28) the failure of appellee to have a horn on his truck in good working order was not negligence; (30) appellee’s driver did not fail to keep a proper lookout; (32) appellee’s driver did fail to apply his brakes before the collision, (33) but such failure was not negligence; (35) appellee’s driver was fully awake at the time, (37) was not driving at an excessive rate of speed; (40) the collision was not the result of an un[290]*290avoidable accident, and (41) appellant’s driver was not acting in an emergency.

After judgment for appellee for $890, costs, etc., on such verdict, appellant, after its motion for new trial was overruled, duly perfected this appeal and here assigns thirteen points of error.

The first two points assert error in the trial court’s refusal to submit its requested special issues 7 and 9, being sole proximate cause issues.

Requested issue No. 7 was as follows: “(a) Do you find, from a preponderance of the evidence, that the driving of plaintiff’s truck by Pipkins onto his left hand side of the roadway and angling across the road striking defendant’s truck in the center line of the highway, if you have so found, was the sole proximate cause of the collision on the occasion in question ? Answer ‘Yes’ or ‘No.’ ” (Lines 7-13, tr. 21.)

Special issue No. 22 as submitted to the jury by the court was as follows: “Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that plaintiff’s driver Pipkin, immediately prior to the collision inquired about herein, was driving plaintiff’s dump truck to his left of the center line of the Roadway. Answer ‘Yes’ or ‘No.’ Answer: No.” (Lines 16-21, tr. SO.) Such issue was followed Iby issues on negligence and proximate cause with instructions not to answer such issues if issue No. 22 answered “No.”

Requested special issue No. 9 is as -follows : “Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that such negligence, if any, was the sole proximate cause of the collision inquired about herein?” (Lines 12-14, tr. 22.)

Special issues Nos. 25, 26 and 27, upon which special issue No. 9 was based and to be No. 26-A, were as follows: “Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that plaintiff’s driver Pipkin drove his dump truck over on his left hand side of the roadway and then cut back to his right hand side of the roadway into defendant’s freight truck upon the time and occasion inquired about herein? Answer Yes or No. Answer: No.” The jury was then instructed that if they answered issue No. 25, “No,” not to answer 26 or 27 being “negligence” and “a proximate cause” issues.

While we are of the opinion there was no error in the refusal of such sole proximate cause issues in connection with the series of issues based on issues 22 and 25 above quoted, since no independent agency or third party was involved, International-G. N. R. Co. v. Acker, Tex.Civ.App., 128 S.W.2d 506, error dis. cor. judg., we are of the further opinion that if there was error, it was harmless error since if submitted, the issues would have been conditionally submitted, based upon affirmative jury answers affirmatively finding the fact situation upon which the issues of negligence and proximate cause were based. The jury having answered that appellee did not do the acts complained of, the negligence, proximate cause, and sole proximate cause issues went out of the case, and the jury, under the proper instructions given by the court, would not have answered them. In the cases cited by appellant the jury found the acts alleged to have been the basis of the negligence and sole proximate cause issues, were in fact committed. Therefore they are not in point.

We are not unmindful of the holding of our Supreme Court in Schuhmacher v. Holcomb, 142 Tex. 332, 177 S.W.2d 951, to the effect that it is the condition at the time of the submission of the case to the jury, and not after verdict, that controls the submission. If the refusal was error at that time, by reason of the record here such error, if any, is now harmless. Being harmless, it is not reversible. The points are overruled.

Points 3 and 4 complain of the submission to the jury of special issue No. 37, as follows: “Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that plaintiff’s driver Pipkin was driving his dump truck at an excessive rate of speed under the facts and circumstances then existing upon the time and occasion inquired about herein?” And the refusal to give his requested charge No. 3, as follows: “Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence, that [291]*291plaintiff's driver, Starling Pipkins, immediately prior to the collision on the occasion in question, was driving plaintiff’s truck at a speed greater than was reasonable and prudent under the conditions then existing, having regard to the actual and potential hazards, when it was approximately three-fifteen o’clock in the morning and he had had only a few hours of sleep?”

The pleading upon which the objection and requested issue were based is as follows: “(1) In driving at approximately three o’clock A. M. in the dark on ‘the highway at a speed greater than was reasonable and prudent under the conditions then existing, having regard to the actual and potential hazards when he knew that it was specially hazardous since he, Starling Pipkins, had only had a few hours of sleep and it was pitch dark.” (Lines 15-21, tr. 12.)

The record shows that the only witnesses to the accident were the two drivers involved. Appellant’s driver did not testify to the speed of appellee’s truck. Appellee’s driver testified he was driving about 20 miles per hour. The physical facts show that the front end of each of the trucks involved was badly bent and damaged.

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Sunset Motor Lines v. Blasingame
245 S.W.2d 288 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1951)

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Bluebook (online)
245 S.W.2d 288, 1951 Tex. App. LEXIS 1879, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/sunset-motor-lines-v-blasingame-texapp-1951.