Karger v. Rio Grande Valley Citrus Exchange
| Decision Date | 29 March 1944 |
| Docket Number | No. 11401.,11401. |
| Citation | 179 S.W.2d 816 |
| Parties | KARGER v. RIO GRANDE VALLEY CITRUS EXCHANGE. |
| Court | Texas Court of Appeals |
Appeal from District Court, Hidalgo County; Bryce Ferguson, Judge.
Suit by Mrs. Jessie Karger against Rio Grande Valley Citrus Exchange for personal injuries sustained as passenger in an automobile collision. From an adverse judgment, plaintiff appeals.
Affirmed.
Wade, Ford & Duke, White & Yarborough, and John White, all of Dallas, and Hardin & Hardin, of Edinburg, for appellant.
Greer & Cox, of McAllen, for appellee.
This suit was instituted in the District Court of Hidalgo County by Jessie Karger, a widow, of Dallas County, in her individual capacity and as administratrix of the estate of her husband, Arthur Karger, deceased, against Rio Grande Valley Citrus Exchange, a corporation, seeking to recover damages sustained by her when an ambulance in which she was riding collided with a truck driven by the agents of said corporation. The collision occurred September 26, 1941, at about 2 a. m., at the intersection of Pacific Avenue and Akard Street in the City of Dallas. The ambulance was traveling in a northerly direction along Akard Street and the truck was traveling in a westerly direction along Pacific Avenue.
The trial was to a jury, and, in keeping with the answers of the jury to the special issues submitted, judgment was rendered that plaintiff take nothing. From that judgment plaintiff has prosecuted this appeal.
Appellant's first point is that the court erred in refusing to submit to the jury plaintiff's requested special issues relative to defendant's truck driver failing to yield the right-of-way. We overrule this point for a number of reasons. In the first place, the court submitted the issues with reference to the negligence of the truck driver in failing to stop at the intersection, and, under the circumstances in this case, it would have been but a different shade of the same issue to have submitted the issue of failure to yield the right-of-way. The ambulance was making an emergency run and was traveling with its siren sounding, in a northerly direction, along Akard Street. The truck was traveling in a westerly direction along Pacific Avenue. The intersection of these two streets is at a right angle. The collision occurred immediately after both vehicles entered the intersection, so it becomes quite apparent that the only way the truck driver could have yielded the right-of-way to the ambulance would have been by stopping before entering the intersection. The evidence shows that the truck driver swerved the truck as far to the right as was possible after entering the intersection but was unable to avoid the collision.
In the second place, the evidence does not show that the ambulance was entitled to the right-of-way. The overwhelming preponderance of the evidence shows that Akard Street is a one-way street and that the ambulance was traveling in the wrong direction on this one-way street. The evidence fails to show that the ambulance was a "police ambulance," so as to come under the provisions of Art. 801 (N) of Vernon's Annotated Penal Code, which gives the right-of-way to "police ambulances." Dallas Ry. & Terminal Co. v. Walsh, Tex.Civ.App., 156 S.W.2d 320, affirmed Sup.Ct., 167 S.W.2d 1018. Likewise, there is no evidence that the ambulance had been designated and authorized by the Chief of Police of the City of Dallas as a vehicle having the right-of-way so as to bring it under the provisions of Section 1, City Ordinance of the City of Dallas, which provides as follows:
Section 1. Authorized Emergency Vehicles. Vehicles of the fire department, police vehicles and such ambulances and emergency vehicles of municipal departments of public service corporations as are designated or authorized by the Chief of Police of the City of Dallas.
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