Miller v. Lucas, U-H

• Decision Date: 13 April 1966
• Docket Number: No. 443,U-H,443
• Citation: 267 N.C. 1,147 S.E.2d 537
• Parties: Annie L. MILLER v. Philip E. LUCAS, Administrator of the Estate of V. W. Doss andaul Company.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

Page 537

147 S.E.2d 537

267 N.C. 1

Annie L. MILLER v. Philip E. LUCAS, Administrator of the Estate of V. W. Doss and U-Haul Company.

No. 443.

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

April 13, 1966.

Hudson, Ferrell, Petree, Stockton, Stockton & Robinson, by W. F. Maready and J. Robert Elster, Winston-Salem, for Philip E. Lucas, Administrator of the Estate of V. W. Doss, defendant appellant.

Womble, Carlyle, Sandridge & Rice, by H. Grady Barnhill, Jr., Winston-Salem, for U-Haul Co., defendant appellant.

White, Crumpler, Powell, Pfefferkorn & Green, by Harrell Powell, Jr., Winston-Salem, for plaintiff appellee.

PARKER, Chief Justice.

Each defendant assigns as error the denial of its and his motion for judgment of compulsory nonsuit made at the clouse of all the evidence.

Plaintiff's evidence, considered in the light most favorable to her, tends to show the following facts: Plaintiff, a 40-year-old woman, about 5 p.m. on 30 May 1963 was driving her automobile at a speed of 25 to 30 miles an hour south on South Broad Street in the city of Winston-Salem. Approaching her was an automobile with a two-wheel trailer attached to its rear driven by defendant Doss at a speed of 25 to 28 miles an hour north on the same street. The Doss automobile traveling down grade 'hit the dip' in the street, and the trailer came loose from the Doss automobile, 'swung around to the left,' and hit the side of her automobile. The tongue of the trailer came inside her automobile and broke out the back side glass and all the rear glass, and practically demolished her automobile. No part of the trailer hit her, but the collision jarred her and swayed her body to the right. She stopped her automobile at the scene, got out and saw the trailer which had been pulled against the curb out of the way of traffic. The safety chains on the trailer were in the hooks on the trailer. When she started walking around, she had pain in her lower back.

T. B. Leach, a police officer of the city of Winston-Salem, arrived at the scene about 5:55 p.m. At the scene the street is about 32 feet wide. The two automobiles, the trailer, and Doss were there when he arrived. The trailer was equipped with a ball-type hitch designed to be clamped to the rear bumper of Doss's automobile. Leach testified that he examined the trailer, and then testified as follows: '(T)he trailer was loaded with tree limbs and branches. The hitch, which was a ball-and-socket hitch, the cap fits down over the ball which is, of course, fastened to the car, and this cap then has a kind of a screw on top of it with which to tighten the coupling there--this top was broken off; the part that you screw down to tighten the coupling, it was broken off. * * * The only connection I found attached to the automobile was the knob or the ball, I call it, to which the trailer is fastened.' He also testified that Doss told him at the scene: 'Mr. Doss stated that he had some work to do in some trees and he needed a trailer, so he went to the service station at Waughtown and Peachtree and rented the trailer from there, and that they hitched the trailer up for him, he did not even get out of the car.' Lucas, administrator, did not object to this evidence.

Evidence offered by U-Haul Company as is favorable to plaintiff or tends to clarify or explain testimony offered by plaintiff not inconsistent therewith (Bundy v. Powell, 229 N.C. 707, 51 S.E.2d 307) tends to show these facts: On the afternoon of 30 May 1963 defendant Doss leased the trailer here from a U-Haul Company dealer, Irvin H. Thomas, Jr., and signed a written lease agreement with U-Haul Company. Thomas attached the trailer to the rear of Doss's automobile. About 7 p.m. on the same day and after it had collided with plaintiff's automobile, Doss brought the trailer back to this dealer. Upon objection by Lucas, administrator, this evidence was not admitted against him, and U-Haul Company excepted. The ball-type hitch when properly clamped to the rear bumper of an automobile prevents 'the trailer from shaking or snaking' behind the automobile to which it is attached. If the ball-type hitch is broken, or the hendle on top is broken, it would have a tendency to cause the trailer to break loose. The trailer here had safety chains fastened to each corner of the trailer body to be hooked to the rear of the chassis of the towing automobile. The purpose of these chains when properly fastened is to keep the trailer attached to the towing vehicle in case something occurs to cause the trailer hitch to come loose or in case it does come loose. If these chains are properly installed, even if the trailer hitch breaks, the trailer would not break loose. The safety chains serve as a precautionary measure should the trailer become disconnected. The U-Haul Company rents trailers. Its employees are taught how to hook trailers to its customers' automobiles. It instructs its employees to take charge of hooking its trailers to its customers' automobiles. When a trailer is rented from U-Haul Company, its procedure is to write up a lease contract for the customer to sign.

Defendant U-Haul Company contends 'the testimony of the broken condition of the hitch after the impact was not competent to prove the condition of the latch before the impact,' and cites the following language from Childress v. Nordman, 238 N.C. 708, 78 S.E.2d 757, in support of its contention:

'This being true, the case falls within the purview of the general rule that mere proof of the existence of a condition or state of facts at a given time does not raise an inference or presumption that the same condition or state of facts existed on a former occasion. (Citing numerous cases.) This general rule is based on the sound concept that inferences or presumptions of fact do not ordinarily run backward. (Citing cases.)'

However, the general rule stated in the Childress case above quoted is not of universal application. 'Whether the past existence of a condition or state of facts may be inferred or presumed from proof of the existence of a present condition or state of facts, or proof of the existence of a condition or state of facts at a given time, depends largely on the facts and circumstances of the individual case, and on the likelihood of intervening circumstances as the true origin of the present existence or the existence at a given time. Accordingly, in some circumstances, an inference as to the past existence of a condition or state of facts may be proper, as, for example, where the present condition or state of facts is one that would not ordinarily exist unless it had also existed at the time as to which the presumption is invoked.' 31A C.J.S. Evidence § 140, pp. 306--307.

This is said in Stansbury, N. C. Evidence, 2d ed., § 90:

'Whether the existence of a particular state of affairs at one time is admissible as evidence of the same state of affairs at another time, depends altogether upon the nature of the subject matter, the length of time intervening, and the extent of the showing, if any, on the question of whether or not the condition had changed in the meantime. The question is one of the materiality or remoteness of the evidence in the particular case, and the matter rests largely in the discretion of the trial court. * * * There has been some reference in recent cases to a 'general rule' that inferences 'do not ordinarily run backward'; but so much depends upon circumstances that it seems a mistake to think in terms of a 'rule' with respect to this or any other of the many factors that must be considered.'

In Blevins v. Erwin Cotton Mills, 150 N.C. 493, 64 S.E. 428, the Court said:

'On the admission of testimony as to the condition of the machine not long before the trial of the cause and twenty-two months after the occurrence, the authorities are very generally to the effect that when the condition of an object at a given time is the fact in issue its condition at a subsequent period may be received in evidence, when the circumstances are such as to render it probable that no change has occurred.'

According to the further answer and defense in the answer of U-Haul Company, it leased the trailer here to V. W. Doss. According to the testimony of its dealer, Irvin H. Thomas, Jr., he attached the trailer to the back of Doss's automobile on the afternoon of 30 May 1963. About 5 p.m. on the same afternoon Doss was driving his automobile with the trailer attached at a speed of 25 to 30 miles an hour on South Broad Street in the city of Winston-Salem traveling down grade and 'hit the dip,' and the trailer came loose from his automobile, 'swung to the left,' and hit the side of plaintiff's automobile which was meeting the Doss automobile. The trailer was pulled against the curb out of the way of traffic. Plaintiff got out of her automobile, went back to the trailer, and at that time the safety chains on the trailer were in the hooks on the trailer. About 5:55 p.m. on the same afternoon T. B. Leach, a police officer of the city of Winston-Salem, arrived at the scene and saw the trailer. He testified as follows as to the condition of the trailer at that time: 'The hitch, which was a ball-and-socket hitch, the cap fits down over the ball which is, of course, fastened to the car, and this cap then has a kind of a screw on top of it with which to tighten the coupling there--this top was broken off; the part that you screw down to tighten the coupling, it was broken off. * * * The only connection I found attached to the automobile was the knob or the ball, I call it, to which the trailer is fastened.' Considering the fact that the trailer became detached from the Doss automobile when it was traveling 25 to 28 miles per hour on a city street of Winston-Salem only a few hours after it had been attached to his automobile by a representative of U-Haul Company; the lack of evidence of any likelihood of any intervening circumstances which could have caused the trailer to come loose from the Doss...