Greer v. King

• Decision Date: 11 October 1967
• Docket Number: No. 559,559
• Citation: 247 Md. 577,233 A.2d 775
• Parties: Ronald D. GREER v. Charles Andrew KING.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

Page 577

247 Md. 577

233 A.2d 775

Ronald D. GREER v. Charles Andrew KING.

No. 559.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

Oct. 11, 1967.

George D. Solter, Baltimore, for appellant.

Nat W. Hopper, Annapolis (Wray & Serio, Annapolis, on the brief), for appellee.

Before HAMMOND, C. J., HORNEY, OPPENHEIMER and FINAN, JJ., and ROBERT E. CLAPP, Jr., Special Judge.

OPPENHEIMER, Judge.

A hitchhiker standing at night on a paved roadway in open country, near the edge of the road, was hit by a motorist. The jury gave a verdict for the injured pedestrian but the trial court granted the driver's motion for judgment n.o.v. This appeal is from that judgment.

The accident occurred in September, 1964, shortly after 1:00 A.M., on State Route 175, between 135 and 150 feet east of the center of its intersection with State Route 170, near Odenton, in Anne Arundel County. The two State Routes intersect at right angles; there is a traffic light overhead which was in operation at the time of the accident. State Route 175 runs approximately east and west, and State Route 170 runs approximately north and south. Both roads are made of concrete with blacktop patches and with a concrete paved shoulder on each side and a sand or gravel shoulder beyond the concrete. Route 175 is straight in this locality and its grade is practically level. There is a center line painted on the road surface dividing the eastbound and westbound lanes of traffic. At the point where the accident occurred, the width of the road surface from the center line to where it meets the concrete shoulder is approximately nine feet; the width of the concrete shoulder before the sand or gravel shoulder is reached is approximately three feet. The paved eastbound lane, therefore, is approximately twelve feet in width.

It was stipulated between the parties that the accident occurred outside the limits of a town or city in what is called country; it did not occur within the confines of the intersection of Routes 175 and 170 and there were no sidewalks on either side of the road. At the time of the accident, the weather was clear and the surface of the road was dry. The light illumination was poor. The speed limit at the scene of the accident was 30 miles an hour.

The appellant, Greer, testified that he had been in the Glen Burnie and Odenton areas during the preceding hours in search of friends living in the neighborhood. At the time of the accident, he was hitchhiking to Route 301. Immediately prior to the accident, he had been inside a hamburger stand on the south side of Route 175 at some distance west of the intersection. He crossed to the north side of the road and walked east through the intersection to a distance of about 135 feet east of it. When he arrived at this point, he glanced over his shoulder and saw the appellee's car approaching at a distance which he estimated to have been about 200 feet west of the intersection. He immediately crossed to the south side of the road and took up a position on the paved shoulder of the eastbound lane, generally facing north, but looking to his left in the direction from which the appellee's automobile was approaching. At this point, the appellee's car was crossing the intersection. The appellant then extended his right arm and thumb in the typical hitchhiker position as the appellee's car approached him. While so standing, expecting the driver of the car either to stop and pick him up, or to continue his course, he was struck on the left side and severely injured.

The appellant came in contact with the right front fender and headlight of the appellee's car and was thrown in the air and to the right side of the road. He had no recollection of the car striking him. The appellant was dressed in a medium blue shirt with dark trousers, was carrying a brown paper bag and had no hat. He had no flashlight or other signaling device. There were trees and bushes beyond the gravel shoulder behind the appellant.

The appellant testified that he was standing on the three foot concrete section of the roadway just at the edge of the road. He said that the only reason he did not step back to the gravel and dirt shoulder when he saw the appellee's car coming down the road was that the gravel shoulder was muddy and he did not want to get the clay on his shoes because, if he did get a ride, he would drag the clay in somebody's car. He testified further that if he had known the appellee was going to have run over him, he would have stepped off the concrete and that he had ample time to do so while the appellee was coming through the intersection but that 'there was still plenty of driving space.'

In the absence of special circumstances or statutes, pedestrians using public highways which are located outside of towns and cities have a duty to watch for and expect to find approaching vehicular traffic thereon and operators of motor vehicles have a corresponding duty to watch for and expect to find pedestrians walking or standing on the sides of highways. Lewis v. Hammond, 247 Md. 297, 231 A.2d 32 (1967); Flohr v. Coleman, 245 Md. 254, 262, 225 A.2d 868 (1967), and cases therein cited.

The facts in this case are, for the most part, undisputed. Taking the testimony in the light most favorable to the appellant and giving him the benefit of all inferences fairly deducible therefrom, we are constrained to hold, as a matter of law, that he was negligent and that his negligence directly contributed to the accident.

Greer's own testimony is that he took and maintained a position on the concrete shoulder of the road, in the lane down which the appellee was driving, although he had seen appellee King's car approaching from the time King went through the intersection at least 135 feet away. It was nighttime, and although the weather was clear, the illumination was poor. Greer was wearing dark clothing and was standing against a background of trees and bushes. The lane down which King was driving, including the concrete shoulder, was only 12 feet wide. Greer assumed that King would either stop, as Greer hoped, to pick him up, or 'go on by.' Greer could easily have stepped back to the gravel shoulder immediately behind him and so avoided the accident,...