General Valet Service, Inc. v. Curley

• Decision Date: 03 January 1973
• Docket Number: No. 112,112
• Citation: 298 A.2d 190,16 Md.App. 453
• Parties: GENERAL VALET SERVICE, INC. v. Thomas Edward CURLEY et al.
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

Page 453

16 Md.App. 453

298 A.2d 190

GENERAL VALET SERVICE, INC. v. Thomas Edward CURLEY et al.

No. 112.

Court of Special Appeals of Maryland.

Jan. 3, 1973.

Aubrey M. Daniel, III, and William E. McDaniel, Washington, D. C., with whom were Williams, Connolly & Califano, Paul R. Connolly, Washington, D. C., Robert L. Karwacki, Miles & Stockbridge, Baltimore, on brief, for appellant.

George W. White, Jr., Baltimore, with whom were Samuel D. Hill, Buckmaster, White, Mindel & Clarke, Baltimore, on brief for appellee Grahes.

Jerome Seidenman, Baltimore, for Curley.

Paul Smelkinson, Baltimore, on brief for appellees Newbys.

David S. Harris, Baltimore, on brief for appellee Kraus.

Argued before MOYLAN, POWERS and GILBERT, JJ.

POWERS, Judge.

Alonzo Stevenson, an employee of General Valet Service, Inc., operating on personal business a motor vehicle described as a step van, leased to General Valet by The Hertz Corporation, drove through a policeman's stop signal and a red light at Harford Road and North Avenue in Baltimore on 3 December 1967 and collided with a Baltimore City fire truck which was responding to a fire.

The collision caused the death of fireman James L. Grahe, injuries to firemen Thomas Edward Curley and Joseph Kraus, injuries and property damage to James Newby, operator of a private car which was struck by the fire engine after the first collision, injuries to Virginia Newby, his passenger, and property damage to the fire engine.

The following suits were filed, and consolidated for trial in the Superior Court of Baltimore City:

1. Thomas Edward Curley v. General Valet Service, Inc. and Alonzo Henry Stevenson, alleging negligence by Stevenson, imputed to General Valet as his employer, and direct negligence by General Valet in entrusting the vehicle to Stevenson.

2. Charlotte E. Grahe as surviving widow, as mother and next friend of James L. Grahe, Jr. and Christine J. Grahe, surviving infant children, and as Administratrix of the Estate of James L. Grahe, deceased v. Alonzo Henry Stevenson, General Valet Service, Inc., and The Hertz Corporation, alleging negligence by Stevenson, and direct negligence by General Valet and by Hertz in entrusting the vehicle to Stevenson.

3. Joseph Kraus, joined by Carole Kraus, his wife, v. Alonzo Henry Stevenson, The Hertz Corporation, and General Valet Service, Inc., alleging negligence by Stevenson, imputed to General Valet and Hertz as his employers, and direct negligence by General Valet in entrusting the vehicle to Stevenson.

4. James Newby, Virginia Newby, and two subrogated insurance companies v. General Valet Service, Inc., Alonzo Henry Stevenson, and The Hertz Corporation, alleging negligence by Stevenson, imputed to General Valet and Hertz as his employers, and direct negligence by General Valet in entrusting the vehicle to Stevenson.

5. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore v. General Valet Service, Inc. and Alonzo Henry Stevenson, alleging negligence by Stevenson, imputed to General Valet as his employer, and direct negligence by General Valet in entrusting the vehicle to Stevenson. ¹

Trial was held before Judge William J. O'Donnell and a jury, beginning 15 November 1971 and ending on 24 November 1971. When all of the plaintiffs had finished their evidence, the court granted motions for a directed verdict in favor of Hertz in all cases in which Hertz was named as a defendant. The court also granted partial directed verdicts in favor of General Valet as to imputed negligence based upon the allegation or inference that Stevenson was acting as General Valet's agent.

At the close of all of the evidence the court denied General Valet's motion for a directed verdict based on the contention that the evidence was insufficient to prove that General Valet negligently entrusted the van to Stevenson. The court granted the motions of all plaintiffs for partial directed verdicts against Stevenson as to his negligence, and instructed the jury to find against him.

The case was submitted to the jury to return a special verdict in the form of answers to questions, as provided for in Maryland Rule 560. The jury assessed damages in favor of Mrs. Grahe as surviving widow at $200,000.00 and as Administratrix at $1,761.90; in favor of the two Grahe children at $75,000.00 each; in favor of Mr. Curley at $300,000.00; in favor of Mr. and Mrs. Kraus at $8,500.00; and in favor of Mr. and Mrs. Newby and their subrogees at $3,302.50. In addition to assessing damages, the jury answered that it found against General Valet Service, Inc. Judgments nisi were entered.

Stevenson and General Valet each filed motions for judgment n.o.v. and for a new trial. All motions were heard and denied, and final judgments were entered on the verdicts.

General Valet appealed; Stevenson did not. Entrustment of the van to Stevenson is conceded. The single issue involved is whether that entrustment was negligent. It will be necessary to examine the law of negligent entrustment as applied to the conduct of General Valet.

In 1934 the Court of Appeals decided the first case of Rounds v. Phillips, 166 Md. 151, 170 A. 532. The appellant there, as administratrix of the estate of her deceased son, had sued appellees, parents of William H. Phillips, Jr., also deceased, alleging in effect that the parents had been negligent in entrusting to their son the automobile he was driving when it collided with a vehicle operated by plaintiff's decedent, resulting in the death of both. The Circuit Court for Wicomico County had sustained demurrers to the declaration below, and the appeal came up on the sufficiency of the allegations. After setting out in full the lengthy first count of the declaration, Judge W. Mitchell Digges said for the Court, at pages 160 and 161, 170 A. at page 535:

'The theory upon which the plaintiff seeks to recover against the defendants is that the defendants permitted, or failed to prohibit, the use of an automobile by their minor son, which son they knew, or should have known from facts known to them, was negligent, reckless, and incompetent in the operation of automobiles.

In other words, the plaintiff invokes the principle involved in Restatement of the Law of Torts, part IV, Negligence, chap. 2, § 390: 'One who supplies directly or through a third person a chattel for the use of another whom the supplier knows or from facts known to him, should know to be likely because of his youth, inexperience or otherwise, to use it in a manner involving unreasonable risk of bodily harm to himself and others whom the supplier should expect to share in, or be in the vicinity of its use, is subject to liability for bodily harm caused thereby to them.'

Up to the present time this court has not had presented to it a case wherein it was necessary to decide the exact point here involved.'

After thus stating the principle of law involved, the Court went on to review numerous authorities; its own earlier opinions which portended the conclusion reached, and the opinions of many courts in other jurisdictions.

As a preface to its reversal of the judgment of the lower court, the Court of Appeals said, at pages 166 and 167, 170 A. at pages 537 and 538:

'We have cited, perhaps at tiresome length, cases and quotations therefrom in order to demonstrate the authority upon which the quotation from the Restatement of the Law of Torts is founded, because, as we have stated, the question has not been heretofore directly passed upon by this court. We are of the opinion, after a careful and exhaustive examination of cases, that the principle contained in the quotation from the Restatement is a fair and accurate statement of the rule, deduced from opinions representing the great weight of authority in this country. Of course, there are, and must be limitations upon the application of the rule; but we find that the facts alleged in the declaration, and admitted to be true for the purpose of the decision on demurrer, are such as to create liability on the part of the defendants.'

The following year saw the same litigants again before the Court of Appeals, after a trial which ended with a directed verdict for the defendants below, and judgment in their favor. In the second Rounds v. Phillips, 168 Md. 120, 177 A. 174, the Court recognized that although the evidence at the trial failed to prove knowledge by the parents of all of the facts alleged concerning their son's driving, there was a series of significant facts of which there was proof at the trial. It appeared that some of these facts had been known to the parents, and that some had not been known to them. The Court said, at page 126, 177 A. at page 176:

'The revocation of his license because of intoxication when driving an automobile was a fact which would naturally prompt an investigation by the defendants as to the habits of their son affecting his qualifications as the driver of a car. If such a course had been pursued, in the proper directions, the defendants would undoubtedly have learned the additional and regrettable facts, proved in this case, as to their son's recklessness in the operation of his car on the public highways. It is therefore inferable that the defendants, from the facts known to them, should have become apprised of the 'unreasonable risk of bodily harm to himself and others' involved in their son's use of an automobile without restraint.' (Emphasis supplied).

The opinions of the Court of Appeals in the two Rounds v. Phillips cases cited above seem to have expressed the doctrine of negligent entrustment so clearly that it received no more appellate attention in Maryland for over 30 years, except for a passing ruling in 1951 in Houlihan v. McCall, 197 Md. 130, 78 A.2d 661, that negligent entrustment was not a proper issue in a case when agency was admitted.

In State of Maryland for Use of Weaver v. O'Brien, D.C., 140 F.Supp. 306 (1956) Chief Judge Thomsen in the United States District Court for the District of Maryland applied...