Tufts v. Hatch

• Citation: 248 A.2d 606
• Parties: Timothy TUFTS et al. v. Mary HATCH and Dale Fleming. Mary Barkowsky SCOTT et al. v. Mary Downs HATCH and Dale Fleming.
• Decision Date: 07 January 1969
• Court: Supreme Judicial Court of Maine (US)

Page 606

248 A.2d 606

Timothy TUFTS et al. v. Mary HATCH and Dale Fleming.

Mary Barkowsky SCOTT et al. v. Mary Downs HATCH and Dale Fleming.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Jan. 7, 1969.

J. Peter Thompson, Lewiston, Albert H. Winchell, Jr., Bangor, for plaintiff.

Mitchell & Ballou, Bangor, for Fleming, by John W. Ballou, Bangor.

Lewis V. Vafiades, Bangor, for Hatch.

Before WILLIAMSON, C. J., and WEBBER, TAPLEY, DUFRESNE, WEATHERBEE, JJ.

WEATHERBEE, Justice.

On appeal by the defendant Dale Fleming.

Dale Fleming was the operator of an automobile which was in collision with one driven by Mary Downs Hatch. Both drivers were injured as was the passenger in each car.

Fleming's passenger, Tufts, brought a complaint for his injuries based on negligence against both Fleming and Mrs. Hatch. Mrs. Hatch's passenger, Mrs. Scott, brought a similar action against both drivers. In addition, Fleming also sued Mrs. Hatch. The three actions were consolidated and tried together. The accident occurred since the effective date of our Comparative Negligence Law. P.L.1965, Chap. 424. The jury returned special verdicts with interrogatories in favor of each plaintiff passenger in his action against the tow drivers. In Fleming's action against Mrs. Hatch the jury's answer to interrogatories reported that the jury found that Mrs. Hatch was guilty of 85% causal negligence and that Fleming was guilty of 15% causal negligence. The Presiding Justice ordered judgments entered in accordance with the jury verdicts.

Only the two actions of the passengers against the two drivers are here on appeal.

During the course of the trial defendant Fleming made a timely request in writing that the Presiding Justice should instruct the jury that if, in the cases of the two passengers against Fleming and Mrs. Hatch, the jury finds that both co-defendants were negligent, and that their combined negligence proximately caused the plaintiffs' injuries, the jury should then indicate the percentage of causal negligence attributable to each co-defendant. No cross-claim for contribution had been brought by either defendant Fleming or defendant Mrs. Hatch. The Justice refused this request. The sole issue raised by this appeal is whether this refusal was error.

The defendant Fleming asks this Court to utilize this case as a vehicle with which to establish judicially the principle of proportionate contribution among co-defendants whose negligence has combined to injure a plaintiff. He suggests to us that such a change would be a logical and seasonable extension of the principle of comparative fault recently adopted in our Comparative Negligence Law.

The rule...