McFarland & Son, Inc. v. Basel

• Decision Date: 15 January 1999
• Docket Number: No. 98-614, No. 98-969.
• Parties: McFARLAND & SON, INC., etc., et al., Appellant/Cross-Appellees, v. Royal Mende BASEL and Steven Kane, etc., Appellees/Cross-Appellants.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

727 So.2d 266

McFARLAND & SON, INC., etc., et al., Appellant/Cross-Appellees, v. Royal Mende BASEL and Steven Kane, etc., Appellees/Cross-Appellants.

Nos. 98-614, 98-969.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fifth District.

January 15, 1999.

Rehearing Denied March 18, 1999.

Michael V. Elsberry and Harry W. Lawrence of Lowndes, Drosdick, Doster, Kantor & Reed, P.A., Orlando, for Appellants/Cross-Appellees.

Edna L. Caruso and Russell S. Bohn of Caruso, Burlington, Bohn & Compiani, P.A., West Palm Beach, and O. John Alpizar of

Alpizar, Ville, Torres & Camfield, Palm Bay, for Appellees/Cross-Appellants.

GOSHORN, J.

McFarland & Son, Inc. and Jonathan Queen (Defendants) appeal the final judgment rendered on the jury verdict issued in the negligence suit filed by Royal Basel and Steven Kane (Plaintiffs) as co-guardians of Mark Basel, a passenger in the car hit by a truck driven by Queen. Defendants assert numerous errors occurred in the course of the trial, one of which we find dispositive. Plaintiffs cross-appeal the denial of their motion for costs and fees under their offer of judgment.¹

Jonathan Queen was driving an eighteen-wheel car carrier for his employer, McFarland & Son, Inc., at 2:00 a.m. on August 6, 1994. He was headed north on 1-95 and had just crossed over the Garden Street overpass in Titusville when he saw a 1984 Grand Prix parked across the right-hand lane and extending perhaps seven inches into the left lane. Later measurements showed the car was between 800 and 924 feet from the top of the overpass. According to Queen, the car's lights were off. He swerved to the left and braked, jack-knifed, and hit the car. The car driver, Jean Ann Basel, was killed instantly; her husband, Mark, was ejected from the car and suffered extreme permanent brain injury.

Mark's injuries left him without memory of the accident. Friends of the two testified Mark was living apart from Jean.² The night of the accident, the two coincidentally wound up at the same bar and left together in Jean's car. Blood tests showed both were legally drunk at the time of the accident. There is no explanation for how or why the two ended up parking at a 70-degree angle across I-95.

Plaintiffs filed a negligence suit against Jean's estate, Queen, and McFarland & Son, Inc. and later successfully moved to amend their complaint to add a count against McFarland & Son, Inc. for the negligent hiring, training, and supervision of Queen. We reverse because of the error in denying McFarland & Son, Inc.'s motion for directed verdict on this count.³

The evidence was simply insufficient to have gone to the jury on the issue of McFarland & Son, Inc.'s negligent hiring, training, and supervision of Queen. At trial, it was established that Queen had been driving for McFarland & Son, Inc. for two years prior to the accident without incident and that Queen had a valid commercial driver's license. Plaintiffs' expert discovered, however, that Queen had not completely filled out his application for employment with McFarland & Son, Inc. The Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) regulations provide that a person "shall not drive" a commercial vehicle until the application for employment is completed. 49 C.F.R. § 391.21. McFarland & Son, Inc. allowed Queen to drive without forcing Queen to comply with this regulation. According to the expert, Queen should not have been driving the night of the accident, although the expert admitted the failure to fill out the application did not cause the accident. In fact, none of the matters which Queen failed to report would have disqualified him from driving for McFarland & Son, Inc.

The simple violation of a licensing statute, unless the violation can be shown to be directly related to the incident, is not proof of negligence. Brackin v. Boles, 452 So.2d 540 (Fla.1984). Without proof of a causal connection between the regulatory restriction and the incident, the finding of liability based on a regulatory deficit is unsustainable. See Dorsett v. Dion, 347 So.2d 826 (Fla. 3d DCA 1977)

.

Plaintiffs assert there was evidence of negligent training, too, which would support the denial of the directed verdict on this count. They contend that McFarland & Son, Inc. knew Queen had never driven an eighteen-wheel rig before, yet only gave him a 50-mile road test and had him ride with another driver for three weeks before putting him on the road in his own rig. McFarland & Son, Inc. gave Queen no formal training on braking. The evidence showed that Queen locked his brakes one half second prior to impact, causing him to lose his ability to steer around the car.

Queen had only a few seconds to figure out how to avoid the emergency situation presented: a car parked at a 70-degree angle across the driving lane of an interstate highway at 2:00 a.m. at most 924 feet from the crest of an overpass. He chose to steer and brake to avoid the car, unfortunately locking the brakes in the process. There was no evidence that his action was that of an untrained driver, or even that training would have prevented Queen from responding as he did in this situation.

As to the supervision aspect, Plaintiffs assert McFarland & Son, Inc.'s failure to teach Queen how to properly fill out his driving logs led to the accident because Queen was falsifying his driving records. They state McFarland & Son, Inc. was aware Queen was not filling in his mileage and if McFarland & Son, Inc. had checked, it would have determined the mileage showed Queen was driving more hours than allowed. However, there is no nexus between improper bookkeeping and the accident. Even if Queen had not violated the ICC Reporting Regulations and even if McFarland & Son, Inc. had required Queen to properly maintain his logbook, the accident would have still occurred. The portion of the final judgment finding that McFarland & Son, Inc. was negligent in hiring, training, and supervising Queen is reversed.

Because our reversal necessitates a new trial, we comment on an additional argument made by Defendants. Defendants argued strenuously both here and below that it was error to allow Plaintiffs' experts to testify to the results of their accident simulations, which simulations were conducted with the exemplar car's headlights on. Defendants contend that just because the light switch was in the "on" position at the end of the crash and the bulb filaments may be consistent with the headlights having been on at the moment of impact, there is no basis to conclude the headlights were on the entire 8.4 seconds before the accident. We disagree. Defendants' argument goes to the weight of the evidence, not its admissibility. The fact that the headlights were on at the moment of impact raises the permissible inference they were on the 8.4...