Shannahan v. Borden Produce Co.
| Decision Date | 23 October 1935 |
| Docket Number | 42955. |
| Citation | 263 N.W. 39,220 Iowa 702 |
| Parties | SHANNAHAN v. BORDEN PRODUCE CO. et al. |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
Appeal from District Court, Woodbury County; A. O. Wakefield, Judge.
Action at law for damages to estate of plaintiff's decedent alleged to have been caused by negligence of defendants. At the close of the plaintiff's evidence the trial court sustained a motion of the defendants for a directed verdict and entered judgment thereon. From such judgment, the plaintiff appeals.
Affirmed.
Gill & Gill, of Sioux City, for appellant.
Jepson, Struble & Sifford and R. A. Oliver, all of Sioux City, for appellees.
About 6 o'clock on the evening of November 28, 1932, William Shannahan was driving from Le Mars to Sioux City on paved highway No. 75 in a model A Ford sedan. This road runs generally in a southwesterly and northeasterly direction and, when Shannahan reached a point approximately one-half mile outside of the city of Le Mars, he ran into the rear end of a truck owned by the defendants, and received injuries from which he died very shortly thereafter. Amanda Shannahan the widow of the decedent, was thereafter appointed administratrix of his estate and brought this action. At the close of plaintiff's evidence the trial court sustained a motion of the defendants for a directed verdict in their favor and entered judgment for the defendants, and the plaintiff appealed. The grounds of defendants' motion were set out in 13 separately numbered paragraphs, and the motion was sustained by the court generally. The real grounds of the motion, however, may be reduced to two, viz., first that the evidence failed to show that the defendants were guilty of negligence which was the proximate cause of the accident; and, second, that the evidence failed to show that the plaintiff's decedent was free from contributory negligence.
If the trial court correctly sustained the motion for a directed verdict on either of these grounds, there can, of course, be no reversal, because it was not only incumbent upon the plaintiff to prove that the negligence of the defendants was the proximate cause of the accident, but also that the plaintiff's decedent was free from negligence which contributed thereto. In determining the correctness of the trial court's ruling we must, of course, consider as true all of the facts established by the evidence in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, together with all reasonable inferences that may be drawn therefrom. We think there was evidence that the time of the accident was more than one-half hour after sunset, that it was then dark, that the truck owned by the defendants and with which the decedent's car collided was standing upon the paved part of the highway, that it did not have any reflectors on the rear thereof, and that there was no lighted tail lamp upon the rear of such truck, and, in considering the correctness of the trial court's ruling on the motion to direct a verdict, we will assume it was a question for the jury to decide whether the defendants were guilty of negligence and whether such negligence was the proximate cause of the accident. Our inquiry is, therefore, narrowed to the one proposition, Was the evidence such that the question of contributory negligence on the part of plaintiff's decedent should have been submitted to the jury?
It is undisputed in the evidence that the place where the accident occurred is upon a straight stretch of highway; that from approximately the point of the accident there is a slight grade downward to the southwest of about 1.24 per cent., and also a slight grade downward northeasterly of about .57 per cent.; that there is no curve or change in the direction of the highway for approximately one-half mile on each side of the place where the accident occurred; that the plaintiff's decedent was driving southwesterly on this highway from Le Mars to Sioux City; that just before his car collided with the defendants' truck he was traveling at a rate of from 35 to 40 miles an hour; that the paved portion of the highway is 20 feet wide and there was a dry shoulder on the right or northwesterly side of the paved portion of the highway about 6 feet in width; that at the time of the accident this shoulder was firm and dry and covered with dead grass of a grayish color; that shortly before the accident occurred two other trucks owned by the defendants were proceeding along this portion of the highway and, on account of some trouble which developed in one of them, they both pulled off to the right or northwesterly side of the paved portion of the highway onto the shoulder; that while these two trucks were thus standing upon the shoulder of the highway, the truck with which the car driven by Shannahan collided, and is referred to in the record as the " Hanford truck," came along the highway going from Le Mars toward Sioux City; that when this Hanford truck reached a point a few feet back of the place where the last or most northerly of the two trucks was parked on the shoulder, it stopped upon the paved portion of the highway and remained at the place where it thus stopped until the collision occurred; that while these three trucks were thus standing, two on their right shoulder of the highway and the third on its right or northwesterly half of the paving, another truck driven by a man named Lake approached on the highway from the southwest going from Sioux City toward Le Mars; that when passing the trucks of the defendants, which were stopped on the shoulder of the road, Lake slowed down, asked the drivers of these trucks if they needed any help, was told that they did not, and then proceeded on toward Le Mars; that the headlights on Lake's truck were lighted, but that some time before he reached the first or most southwesterly of the two trucks that were parked on the shoulder of the road, Lake turned on what is known as his courtesy lights, so that the direct rays from the headlights were deflected downward toward the pavement; that as Lake approached the trucks which were parked on the shoulder on the northwesterly side of the road he saw the Shannahan car approaching from Le Mars and going toward Sioux City; that the Shannahan car was on its right or northwesterly side of the pavement, and its headlights were lighted; that when the truck which Lake was driving reached a point where his headlights were about even with the rear end of the Hanford truck the Shannahan car ran into the rear end of the Hanford truck; that at the time the Shannahan car hit the rear end of the Hanford truck, Lake, seated in the cab of his truck, was a little ways, about 10 feet, from the rear end of the Hanford truck; and that as the Shannahan car came up and hit the rear end of the Hanford truck it was traveling at a speed of 35 to 40 miles an hour.
Among the grounds alleged by appellees in their motion for a directed verdict, because of the failure of the evidence to show that appellant's decedent was free from contributory negligence, were the allegations that the decedent, William Shannahan, was at the time of the accident violating the statute which required him to drive his car at such a speed as to be able to bring it to a stop within the assured clear distance ahead, and that he had failed to keep a proper lookout. The appellant contends that, because of the peculiar facts attending the accident, the court could not, as a matter of law, hold that the appellant's decedent was guilty of contributory negligence in either of these respects. The argument in support of this contention is substantially as follows: That the evidence was such that the jury could find therefrom that at the time of the accident the most southerly of the defendants' trucks was about 20 feet long; that there was a space of probably 20 feet between that truck and the second truck which was also parked upon the shoulder of the road and which was approximately 30 feet long; that there was a little space between the rear of the second truck and what is known as the Hanford truck; that the taillights were lighted on the rear of the first two trucks which were parked upon the shoulder of the highway; that there was no light and no reflectors upon the rear end of the Hanford truck; that the Hanford truck was painted yellow that the body of the Hanford truck was approximately 7 1/2 feet wide and occupied practically the entire width of the right or northwesterly half of the paved portion of the highway; that the point at which the collision actually occurred is just about where the break in the grade takes place, or a little to the southwest thereof; that because of the break in the grade about the point where the collision actually occurred the rays from the headlights of the Lake truck, although deflected toward the pavement, were thrown upon the windshield of the Shannahan car and into the eyes of appellant's decedent about the time he was approaching the rear end of the Hanford truck; that these rays of light cast upon his windshield and in his eyes would tend to obscure the vision of the appellant's decedent;...
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