Beletti v. Schuster

• Decision Date: 12 June 1962
• Docket Number: No. 50598,50598
• Citation: 253 Iowa 1166,115 N.W.2d 858
• Parties: Sandra BELETTI, Appellant, v. Joe SCHUSTER and Frank Schuster, Appellees.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Page 858

115 N.W.2d 858

253 Iowa 1166

Sandra BELETTI, Appellant, v. Joe SCHUSTER and Frank Schuster, Appellees.

No. 50598.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

June 12, 1962.

Edward J. Flattery, Fort Dodge, for appellant.

Linnan, Lynch & Straub, Algona, for appellees.

LARSON, Justice.

The principal issue before us in this appeal is whether at the close of plaintiff's evidence a jury question was presented under Section 321.494, Code of Iowa, 1958, I.C.A., commonly referred to as the guest statute. The trial court thought not and directed a verdict for defendants. We agree with that determination.

Plaintiff, defendant Joe Schuster, and another couple were returning to Fort Dodge from a Sunday trip to West Bend to see the Grotto on this bright sunny afternoon of August 3, 1958, when they were involved in a one-car accident a few miles east of West Bend, Iowa, on a recently-blacktopped highway. Joe, 15 years of age, possessed a learner's permit, was driving a 1951 Ford car owned by his father, the defendant Frank Schuster. From the record we learn that shortly after this party had commenced their return trip, an unidentified car came up beside them, drove parallel for some time as though inviting a race and, when the challenge was not accepted, completed the pass. Joe did not increase or decrease his speed of 50 to 55 miles per hour, and when the other car slowed in front of him to about 30 miles per hour, he turned out to pass it. The other car then increased its speed and Schuster drove up to 65 miles per hour in order to complete the pass.

The record is not clear as to whether there were other passes by these vehicles, nor as to which of these cars first reached a certain intersection, east of which this accident occurred. It is clear, however, that the other car turned around at that intersection and headed back toward the west, and was not less than a half mile west of the Schuster car when defendant's car left the highway and landed in the north ditch. In this accident plaintiff was thrown out of the car and received the serious injuries for which she seeks recovery.

The record is clear that the Schuster car was traveling on its own side of the straight, level, dry-surfaced highway just before the accident, at about 50 or 55 miles per hour, that the blacktopping at that place was 21 feet and 10 inches wide, that there was a 3 to 5 inch dropoff on the sides, a narrow gravel shoulder, and a steep sloping ditch on each side some 8 to 10 feet deep. When defendant's vehicle was from one half to one and one half miles east of the intersection, the defendant driver looked around, either to the left or right, to see what had happened to the other car. In that instant one of the right tires dropped off the blacktop and his effort to bring it back resulted in a slide or skid northeasterly across the blacktop into the north ditch. The look to the rear was momentary but, as Joe said, when the wheel left the blacktop, 'there was no holding it.' There was some evidence that the vehicle went into the south ditch, then up and over the highway, but it seems most likely it proceeded as Joe stated, that it followed down the edge in the gravel until it came to a driveway to the south and then went up and over the blacktop. At any rate Schuster lost control of the vehicle when the wheel left the hard surface and this accident resulted.

It may well be that Joe's act in turning to look back was willful and intentional and in this situation constituted an act of negligence, but proof of negligence is not sufficient to generate a jury question of recklessness, nor does such an act alone, although intentional, give rise to an inference of recklessness. This is not such a willful act as we have condemned in 'chicken' cases or where the willful act is accompanied by a disregard of consequence in the face of unusual hazard or danger. Hahn v. Strubel, 243 Iowa 438, 52 N.W.2d 28. Much more than a mere showing of momentary inattentiveness to his driving is required to establish recklessness under Section 321.494 of the Code, I.C.A. Even with all permissible inferences under the evidence taken in a light most favorable to plaintiff, we find in this record nothing to indicate a no-care attitude, a disregard for consequences or a heedless disregard of danger on the part of young Schuster. We doubt that even while the harassment was in progress, Joe's acts were sufficient to raise an inference of no care, and clearly that ordeal had been terminated some time before this accident.

I. Although the plaintiff in a guest-statute case is entitled to the benefit of all favorable inferences which may reasonably be drawn from the evidence, it is his burden to show an act or acts utterly inconsistent with prudence or proper regard for the safety of the guests. Lewis v. Baker, 251 Iowa 1173, 104 N.W.2d 575, 577; Goodman v. Gonse, 247 Iowa 1091, 1101, 76 N.W.2d 873, and cases cited therein; Russell v. Turner, D.C., 56 F.Supp. 455, 462; Wright v. What Cheer Clay Prod. Co., 221 Iowa 1292, 1297, 267 N.W. 92, 95; Shenkle v. Mains, 216 Iowa 1324, 247 N.W. 635; Nesci v. Willey, 247 Iowa 621, 75 N.W.2d 257. The definition of 'reckless operation' set forth in Siesseger v. Puth, 213 Iowa 164, 182, 239 N.W. 46, 54, has, since its announcement been followed without exception, and although we acknowledge it is cold comfort for a lawyer, or a trial judge who has such a matter before him, to be told no hard and fast rule which will apply to all situations can be devised, it is nevertheless true. Schneider v. Parish, 242 Iowa 1147, 49 N.W.2d 535. We must therefore make our determination here upon those facts and circumstances presented by this record.

It is, of course, the trial court's duty to first consider the facts disclosed, and if it can reasonably be said that they tend to support an inference of recklessness, then it must submit the question to the jury. But if the facts disclosed will support a finding of recklessness only through speculation and conjecture, the matter must not be submitted for jury determination. Mescher v. Brogan, 223 Iowa 573, 272 N.W. 645; Goodman v. Gonse, supra.

Here we find no complaint that Joe Schuster was driving too fast, that he had taken any chances, was angry or unduly excited, nor that he had frightened anyone with his operation of the vehicle. The only facts disclosed which would tend to create an inference of recklessness are the look to the rear without slowing down his vehicle, and the attempt to bring his vehicle back onto the blacktop at that speed. Neither are...