Peterson v. Sheridan

• Decision Date: 31 October 1940
• Docket Number: No. 11733.,11733.
• Citation: 115 F.2d 121
• Parties: PETERSON v. SHERIDAN.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

115 F.2d 121 (1940)

PETERSON v. SHERIDAN.

No. 11733.

Circuit Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit.

October 31, 1940.

F. J. Lund, of Webster City, Iowa, and T. J. Mahoney, of Boone, Iowa, for appellant.

Paul W. Steward of Des Moines, Iowa (Ray C. Fountain, of Des Moines, Iowa, on the brief), for appellee.

Before SANBORN, WOODROUGH, and THOMAS, Circuit Judges.

WOODROUGH, Circuit Judge.

This action was brought by the administrator of the estate of Embert Peterson, deceased, to recover damages for Embert Peterson's death resulting immediately from an automobile collision which occurred at about three o'clock of a clear night at the junction of the Lincoln Highway (U. S. No. 30) and State Primary Road No. 60, two or three miles east of Boone, Iowa. No outside witness saw the accident, but the administrator claimed that the defendant, driving north on Highway No. 60, had made a left turn to the west from Highway No. 60 into the Lincoln Highway in the face of the near approach of the decedent's car going east in its proper lane on said highway, although the hazard of collision with decedent's car was apparent, and that defendant so negligently caused the death of Embert Peterson. Testimony adduced by the administrator concerning the positions of the two cars and the location of broken glass, debris and marks upon the pavement immediately after the accident tended to sustain his claim that defendant's car had turned left off of Highway No. 60 onto the Lincoln Highway into decedent's lane of travel so near the approaching car that collision had occurred almost immediately after the turning.

The defendant was injured and rendered unconscious by the collision, but was able to testify by deposition and at the trial. He denied that the collision happened as claimed by plaintiff and stated that he drove his car north on Highway No. 60 up to the edge of the Lincoln Highway and stopped it there; that while it was then and there standing at rest on Highway No. 60 in the proper lane and parallel to the edge of the paving of No. 60 and projecting possibly two or three inches only into the Lincoln Highway, he saw a flash of light and heard a crash as his car was struck almost head-on by Embert Peterson's car. The right side of the front end of one car contacted the right side of the front end of the other car. Defendant's witnesses located the defendant's car after the accident in a position different from the location ascribed to it by plaintiff's witnesses. The position defendant's witnesses indicated was fairly compatible with the car having been struck at the point claimed by defendant.

The court instructed the jury that if they found that "defendant drove his car into said Highway 30 in the face of the near approach of Embert Peterson's car, although the hazard of collision therewith was apparent", or "that he drove his car into Highway 30 and failed to yield the right of way to Embert Peterson's car, although said car was then within the intersection or approaching so closely that the hazard of collision therewith was apparent," and that such acts of negligence on the part of the defendant were "the proximate cause of the collision and the resultant death of Embert Peterson", then they should find for the plaintiff if plaintiff "also established by a preponderance of the evidence that Embert Peterson was himself free from any negligence on his part which in any manner or in any degree contributed to the collision and his resultant death."

It was reiterated in the instructions that before the plaintiff could recover he was required to establish by preponderance of the evidence that Embert Peterson was himself free from any negligence which in any manner or in any degree directly contributed to the collision which resulted in his death,¹ and it is not disputed that in negligence cases in Iowa the plaintiff is required to affirmatively establish his own freedom from negligence.

But the rigor of the Iowa rule is mitigated to the extent that where a human being is killed in an accident and there is no eye witness, the Iowa law indulges the inference that the instinct of self preservation and the love of life were such as to prompt him to exercise ordinary care for his safety. Ames v. Waterloo & Cedar Falls R. T. Co., 120 Iowa 640, 95 N.W. 161, and the plaintiff requested an instruction in this case authorizing the jury to indulge the inference in the plaintiff's favor with reference to matters not accounted for by direct credible testimony.² The court refused to give the requested instruction and gave no instruction on the subject of the inference of due care prompted by the instinct of self preservation. The whole effect of the instructions given to the jury therefore was that even if the jury found the defendant had negligently made the left turn into deceased's lane of travel in the face of the near approach of deceased's car and so caused the accident and death, still the plaintiff could not recover without first discharging the burden of freeing the decedent from any negligence which in any manner or in any degree contributed to the collision.

The jury found for the defendant, and on this appeal from the judgment of dismissal the administrator contends that the court erred in refusing to give the instruction requested on the subject of the inference of due care indulged by Iowa law, and that by omitting to give any instruction concerning the inference of due care an impossible burden of proof was imposed on plaintiff and his right under the Iowa law was erroneously denied.

It is contended, on the other hand, that under the circumstances of this case there was no room for any inference of due care to be drawn in plaintiff's favor from the deceased's instinct of self preservation; that defendant was an eye witness to the accident and that his testimony established the negligence of deceased so as to preclude any recovery on the part of plaintiff.

It must be conceded that if the accident here involved occurred in the way defendant stated that it did — as the result of decedent's driving off the highway No. 30 on which he was traveling, into defendant's car then standing on Highway No. 60, certainly the accident was decedent's fault. There could be no recovery and decedent's handling of his car before the collision would be immaterial. But if the accident occurred in the way the plaintiff's testimony tended to show that it did — that is, because defendant made a left turn off of Highway No. 60 onto Highway No. 30 in the face of decedent's closely approaching car, then the decedent's handling of his car was a material inquiry under the court's instructions and under the law. Although it is a mortally dangerous act to make such a left turn in the face of a closely approaching car,³ and although serious injuries directly result, still the victim in the closely approaching car must under the law of Iowa be affirmatively shown to have been free from negligence before there can be recovery for damages so inflicted upon him. If he is killed, however, and nobody saw or is found to testify about his handling of his car before or at the time he was struck, then under the law of Iowa his administrator in a suit for the wrongful death is entitled to an instruction upon the inference of due care to be indulged from the instinct of self preservation. It is true that such inference of due care prompted by the instinct of self preservation can not be availed of to controvert or annul the effect of direct credible testimony of an eye witness. Edwards v. Perley, 223 Iowa 1119, 274 N.W. 910; Spooner v. Wisecup, 227 Iowa 768, 288 N.W. 894. Whether the defendant's account of what happened is or is not true, is not to be determined by an inference of due care on decedent's part. Young v. Railroad, 223 Iowa 773, 273 N.W. 885. But the plaintiff relied upon physical facts and circumstances to establish that a negligent left turn by defendant in the face of decedent's closely approaching car caused the accident. If his claim was established by preponderance of evidence, then he became entitled to the inference of due care on decedent's part. Hittle v. Jones, 217 Iowa 598, 250 N.W. 689. The defendant's account of what he saw was limited to...