Stewart v. Motts

• Decision Date: 15 February 1995
• Citation: 654 A.2d 535,539 Pa. 596
• Parties: Jonathon STEWART, Appellant, v. Martin MOTTS, II, t/d/b/a Mott's Radiator, Appellee.
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

Page 535

654 A.2d 535

539 Pa. 596

Jonathon STEWART, Appellant, v. Martin MOTTS, II, t/d/b/a Mott's Radiator, Appellee.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

Argued Dec. 8, 1994.

Decided Feb. 15, 1995.

[539 Pa. 599] Ronald K. Mishkin, for J. Stewart.

William G. Ross, G. Christopher Parrish, Marvin O. Schwartz, for M. Motts.

Before NIX, C.J., and FLAHERTY, ZAPPALA, PAPADAKOS, CAPPY, CASTILLE and MONTEMURO, JJ.

OPINION

MONTEMURO, Justice.

Appellant, Jonathon Stewart, appeals from an order and memorandum opinion of the Superior Court affirming a judgement of the Court of Common Pleas of Monroe County following a verdict in favor of appellee, Martin Motts, in this action for personal injuries, 434 Pa.Super. 709, 641 A.2d 1238.

The sole issue presented before us is whether there exists a higher standard of "extraordinary care" for the use of dangerous instrumentalities over and above the standard of "reasonable care" such that the trial court erred for failing to give an instruction to the jury that the Appellee should have used a "high degree of care" in handling gasoline. Because we believe that there is but one standard of care, the standard of "reasonable care", we affirm.

The pertinent facts of this case are simple and were ably stated by the trial court:

On July 15, 1987, Plaintiff, Jonathon Stewart, stopped at Defendant, Martin Motts' auto repair shop and offered assistance to the Defendant in repairing an automobile fuel tank. In an effort to start and move the car with the gasoline tank unattached, the Plaintiff suggested and then proceeded to pour gasoline into the carburetor. The Defendant was to turn the ignition key at a given moment. While the exact sequence of events was contested, the tragic result was that the car backfired, caused an explosion and resulted in Plaintiff suffering severe burns to his upper body. On October 8, 1992, following a two day trial, a jury returned a verdict for the defendant thus denying the Plaintiff's claim for damages.

Stewart v. Motts, No. 52 Civil of 1988, slip op. at 1 (Court of Common Pleas of Monroe County, Dec. 18, 1992).

The only issue raised before this Court is the refusal of the trial court to read Stewart's requested point for charge No. 4. This point for charge reads:

We are instructing you that gasoline due to its inflammability, is a very dangerous substance if not properly handled. Therefore, it is incumbent on Mr. Stewart to use care in pouring the gasoline into the motor vehicle. It is also the duty of Mr. Motts to use care in starting the machine to see that the vehicle started without any risk of harm to anyone, particularly Mr. Stewart. The backfiring of engines without the air filter on them does occur. Both Motts, and Stewart, realized, or should have realized the dangerous nature of this substance, and knew, or should have known that the engine may backfire, and/or that the gas may ignite, and burn. With an appreciation of such danger, and under conditions where its existence reasonably should have been known, there follows a high degree of care which circumscribes the conduct of everyone about the danger, and whether the parties, Motts, t/a Motts Radiator, and Stewart, acted as reasonable men under the circumstances is for you the jury to decide. See Konchar v. Cebular, 333 Pa. 499, 3 A.2d 913 (1939).

The trial court denied this point of charge finding that it was "cumulative with respect to the standard charge given by the Court...." Stewart, slip op. at 3. In this appeal, Stewart argues that the trial court erred in failing to read point of charge No. 4 to the jury because Pennsylvania law applies an "extraordinary" or "heightened duty of care" to those employing a dangerous agency.

We begin our discussion by reaffirming the principle that there is but one standard of care to be applied to negligence actions involving dangerous instrumentalities in this Commonwealth. This standard of care is "reasonable care" as well stated in the Restatement (Second) of Torts:

The care required is always reasonable care. The standard never varies, but the care which it is reasonable to require of the actor varies with the danger involved in his act and is proportionate to it. The greater the danger, the greater the care which must be exercised....

Restatement (Second) of Torts § 298 comment b (1965).

This comment goes on to say that where the reasonable character of an actor's conduct is in question "its utility is to be weighed against the magnitude of the risk which it involves." Id. Thus, if an act involves risk of death or bodily injury, "the highest attention and caution are required...." Therefore, the comment concludes, "those who deal with firearms, explosives, poisonous drugs or high tension electricity are required to exercise the closest attention and the most careful precautions ..." Id.

Properly read, our cases involving dangerous agencies reaffirm these well accepted principles found in the Restatement. In Konchar v. Cebular, 333 Pa. 499, 3 A.2d 913 (1939), a case relied upon heavily by appellant in the case at bar, the plaintiff drove into a gas station and ordered a gallon of gasoline. The defendant began pumping gas into the motorcycle, but when three quarters of a gallon was placed in the tank, the gasoline overflowed and ran into the hot cylinders of the engine. The plaintiff, sitting on the motorcycle, was burned when the gasoline exploded. In the subsequent lawsuit for personal injuries, the jury returned a verdict to the defendant. The plaintiff claimed that the trial court erred in sending the question of his contributory negligence to the jury. In deciding the case, this Court noted that gasoline was a dangerous substance requiring a "high duty of care." Konchar, 333 Pa. at 501, 3 A.2d at 914. We affirmed, holding that, "[i]t was for the jury to decide whether, under all of the circumstances, [the plaintiff] had acted as a reasonably prudent man." Id. Thus, we recognized that the question of the plaintiff's contributory negligence was to be determined using the reasonable care standard in light of the particular circumstances of the case. One such circumstance, we acknowledged, was that gasoline, a dangerous substance, was involved requiring that the reasonably prudent person exercise a higher degree of care under these circumstances. Taken in context, our statement that the plaintiff was under a "high duty of care" did nothing more than reaffirm the general principle that the care employed by a reasonable man must be proportionate to the danger of the activity.

Similarly, in Fredericks v. Atlantic Refining Co., 282 Pa. 8, 127 A. 615 (1925), the plaintiff pulled into the station and requested gasoline. He was handed the hose and inserted it in the opening. When the valve failed to stop the flow, he called for the attendant to shut off the pump. Instead, the attendant yanked the hose out of the plaintiff's hands causing gasoline to be thrown all over. The gasoline caught fire, severely burning the plaintiff. We affirmed the trial court finding that the plaintiff had sustained his claim of negligence. In affirming, our Court stated the general principle that "[n]egligence is absence or want of care under the circumstances." Fredericks, 282 Pa. at 13, 127 A. at 616. We found that "a higher degree of care is required in dealing with a dangerous agency than in the ordinary affairs of life or business which involve little or no risk." Id. Ultimately we held that "[n]o absolute standard can be fixed by law, but every reasonable precaution suggested by experience and the known danger ought to be taken." Id. We closely followed the reasoning of Fredericks in MacDougall v. Pennsylvania Power & Light, 311 Pa. 387, 166 A. 589 (1933) (electricity as a dangerous agency); Pryor v. Chambersburg Oil & Gas Co., 376 Pa. 521, 103 A.2d 425 (1954) (gasoline as a dangerous agency). We do not believe that these cases created a heightened or extraordinary standard of care above and beyond the standard of reasonable care for handling dangerous agencies. When we referred to a "higher degree of care" in these cases, we were not creating a second tier of "extraordinary care" over and above ordinary or reasonable care. Instead, we were simply recognizing the general principle that under the reasonable care standard, the level of care must be proportionate to the danger involved. Our use of the language "higher degree of care" merely stated the common sense conclusion that the use of a dangerous agency would require the reasonably prudent person to exercise more care. In fact these cases rejected any formalistic higher standard of care in holding that "no absolute standard of care [could] be fixed by law."

Admittedly, this notion of a heightened level of "extraordinary care" for the handling of dangerous agencies has crept into our jurisprudence. In Kuhns v. Brugger, 390 Pa. 331, 135 A.2d 395 (1957), this Court considered the proper standard of care for negligence involving a handgun. The defendant in this case was a grandfather who had left a loaded handgun in an unlocked dresser drawer. While alone in the house, his grandchild found the gun and inadvertently shot another child. We affirmed the trial court's finding that the grandfather was negligent for permitting a highly dangerous instrumentality to be in the place where a child could come into contact with it. In so affirming, we found that the possession of a loaded handgun placed upon the defendant the duty of, "exercising not simply ordinary, but extraordinary care so that no harm might be visited upon others." Kuhns, 390 Pa. at 344, 135 A.2d at 403. This language in Kuhns on its face unfortunately suggests that this Commonwealth recognizes a separate standard of care, "extraordinary care", for dangerous instrumentalities above and beyond "ordinary care." We reject this suggestion. We note that the Kuhns Court adopted the above-quoted language without citation to or consideration of this...