Dirickson v. Mings

• Decision Date: 16 January 1996
• Docket Number: No. 83163,83163
• Citation: 1996 OK 2,910 P.2d 1015
• Parties: Jay E. DIRICKSON, an Oklahoma resident, Appellant, v. Scott Alan MINGS, an Oklahoma resident and Farmers Insurance Company, Inc., Appellees.
• Court: Oklahoma Supreme Court

Page 1015

910 P.2d 1015

1996 OK 2

Jay E. DIRICKSON, an Oklahoma resident, Appellant, v. Scott Alan MINGS, an Oklahoma resident and Farmers Insurance Company, Inc., Appellees.

No. 83163.

Supreme Court of Oklahoma.

Jan. 16, 1996.

On Certiorari to the Court of Appeals, Division III.

John E. Vitali, Hornbeek, Krahl & Vitali, Oklahoma City, for Appellant.

Randy D. Witzke, Edmonds, Cole, Hargrave, Givens & Witzke, Oklahoma City, for Appellees.

ALMA WILSON, Chief Justice:

The issue in this case involves whether parking a disabled vehicle on a city street constitutes a mere condition or the proximate cause of a traffic accident that subsequently occurs. Because the facts are not in dispute, the question is whether summary judgment is proper. We find that more than one conclusion could reasonably be drawn from the facts, and therefore summary judgment is improper.

I. SUMMARY OF FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

Shortly before midnight on February 3, 1993, the appellee, Scott Alan Mings, was driving his 1965 Ford pickup to work on Memorial Road in Oklahoma City when he experienced engine trouble. The pickup coasted into the right hand lane and up against the curb. The pickup was not equipped with emergency flashers. Mings testified by deposition that the vehicle lights were not designed to work when the ignition is off and the keys are out. He took the keys with him to get into his place of employment, the grounds of which were only a few yards from where the vehicle came to rest. He went to summon the plant tow truck, which came within ten minutes.

The appellant, Jay E. Dirickson, was returning home in his car after playing pool with some friends at a nearby bar. He was following another car in the right-hand lane, headed west on Memorial Road between the Broadway Extension and Santa Fe. He testified by deposition that both he and the car in front of him were traveling between forty to forty-five miles per hour, when the other car suddenly swerved into the left lane. Dirickson did not remember seeing or striking the parked pickup truck of Mings.

After Dirickson filed a lawsuit for negligence, Mings moved for summary judgment, which the district court granted. The court found that the negligence of Mings, if any, constituted a condition, and not a cause of the traffic accident. The Court of Appeals affirmed. Dirickson petitioned for certiorari, which this Court granted.

II. CONDITION VERSUS CAUSE

Before the district court and the Court of Appeals, Mings prevailed on his summary judgment argument that his parked pickup truck was neither the proximate cause of the accident, nor of Dirickson's injuries. He argued that this Court has consistently held in similar factual situations that a disabled and/or illegally parked vehicle constitutes a mere condition, not a cause of an ensuing accident. He then cites seven Oklahoma cases involving collisions with vehicles stopped on the roadway to support his argument. ¹

The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals has applied what it has called the Oklahoma "Mere Condition Rule" to rear end collisions with negligently parked vehicles, and has sustained trial court rulings that as a matter of law, the act of negligent parking is non-actionable in view of the subsequent superseding act of the rear end collision. John Long Trucking v. Greear, 421 F.2d 125, 127 (10th Cir.1970). But the court observed that not everyone who negligently parks his vehicle is relieved of all liability when another negligently collides with it. The court reasoned that an intervening act may or may not supersede the antecedent negligence, depending upon a variety of situations. John Long Trucking, 421 F.2d at 127.

"Parked car cases" ² do not have special rules, but are controlled by the general rules of negligence law. "Negligence is the failure to observe for the protection of the interests of another person, that degree of care, precaution and vigilance, which the circumstances demand, whereby such other person suffers injury." Nehring v. Russell, 582 P.2d 67, 73 (Wyo.1978). The elements of negligence are (1) the existence of a duty on the part of a defendant to protect the plaintiff from injury; (2) a violation of that duty; and (3) injury proximately resulting from the violation. Sloan v. Owen, 579 P.2d 812, 814 (Okla.1977). Concerning duty of care, a driver of a motor vehicle must, at all times, use that degree of care which is reasonable and prudent under the circumstances. Agee v. Gant, 412 P.2d 155, 159 (Okla.1966). Therefore, a failure to exercise that degree of care which results in injury to another is actionable negligence.

Dirickson argued to the trial court that Mings failed to warn oncoming vehicles pursuant to 47 O.S.1991, § 11-1001, ³ and additionally failed to employ any warning device pursuant to 47 O.S.1991, § 12-408. ⁴ Although we do not decide whether either of the cited statutes were violated, ⁵ a violation of a statute or city ordinance constitutes actionable negligence only where the injury is the proximate result of the violation. Woodward v. Kinchen, 446 P.2d 375, 377 (Okla.1968). A negligent or careless act is not necessarily actionable negligence. Woodward, 446 P.2d at 377. But Dirickson need not prove the violation of a statute to prove that Mings violated a duty of care in parking his pickup truck. We have held that a parked vehicle constituting a source of danger to other vehicles is generally bound to exercise ordinary or reasonable care to give adequate warning or notice to approaching traffic, and the duty exists regardless of the reason for stopping. The driver of the stopped vehicle must take precautions reasonably calculated to prevent injury, whether by the use of lights, flags, guards, or other practical means. A failure to give such warning may constitute negligence, even in the absence of any specific duty imposed by governmental regulation. ⁶

After the initial requirement that Dirickson prove a violation of the duty of care by Mings, the law requires that Dirickson prove that his injuries resulted directly and proximately from the violation of the duty of care. Woodward, 446 P.2d at 377. Proximate cause has also been called "direct cause." It has been defined in the Oklahoma Uniform Jury Instructions as "a cause which, in the natural and continuous sequence, produces injury and without which the injury would not have happened." Tomlinson v. Love's Country Stores, 854 P.2d 910, 916 (Okla.1993). More traditionally, proximate cause has been defined in our cases as "the efficient cause which sets in motion the chain of circumstances leading to the injury." Thur v. Dunkley, 474 P.2d 403, 405 (Okla.1970). Thur continues, "if the negligence complained of merely furnishes a condition by which the injury was made possible and a subsequent independent act caused the injury, the existence of such condition is not the proximate cause of the injury." Thur, 474 P.2d at 405. "Foreseeability is an essential element of proximate cause in Oklahoma, and it is the standard by which proximate cause, as distinguished from the existence of a mere condition, is to be tested." Atherton v. Devine, 602 P.2d 634, 636 (Okla.1979). "A condition also begins with the breach of a duty of care. With a condition, however, the subsequent injury was neither foreseeable nor reasonably anticipated as the probable result of the breach." Tomlinson, 854 P.2d at 914. "The question of causation is one of fact for the jury unless there is no evidence from which the jury could reasonably find a causal nexus between the negligent act and the resulting injuries." Tomlinson, 854 P.2d at 916.

To illustrate these principles, the facts and holdings of two cases among the parked car cases can be compared. The first case is Sturdevant v. Kent, 322 P.2d 408 (Okla.1958). Sollee, the employee of Sturdevant, drove a pickup truck to repair a roof at a school. When he pulled into the drive, about 8:00 a.m., his truck mired down and was stuck. He was able to back it out where the rear wheels were on the shoulder of the paving and the rear of the truck extended into the street several feet. He then left the vehicle. A short time later, Kent drove his pickup down the same street and collided with the rear part of Sturdevant's pickup, which was out in the street. Alleging violation of a city ordinance requiring motor vehicles to be parked parallel, and not obstruct travel, Kent received a jury verdict in his favor. This Court observed that Sturdevant's pickup occupied no greater part of the street than if it had been parked parallel. Twelve feet of the roadway were unobstructed, with no other vehicles in the vicinity. Kent testified that he had seen the pickup from 300 feet away, but assumed it was pulling into the driveway. The Court reasoned that the testimony revealed the proximate cause of the collision to be Kent's failure to look where he was going. Sturdevant, 322 P.2d at 410. A motorist that collides with another vehicle parked on the roadway is guilty of negligence proximately causing the collision if he could have seen the parked vehicle in time to avoid the collision. Sturdevant, 322 P.2d at 410. The Court found that the trial court erred in refusing to direct a verdict in favor of the defendants, and reversed and remanded the case.

By contrast, in the case of England v. Kilcrease, 456 P.2d 521 (Okla.1969), this Court affirmed a judgment for the plaintiff. The defendant's car stalled in the right-hand lane of traffic of a four-lane highway. The plaintiff, driving fifty-five to sixty miles per hour, was following a pickup truck in the right-hand lane, in her own pickup truck, when the pickup she was following suddenly pulled sharply from the right lane to the left to avoid the defendant's stalled car. The plaintiff collided with the rear of the defendant's car. The defendant asserted that ...