Sun Cab Co. v. Cusick

• Decision Date: 14 March 1956
• Docket Number: No. 115,115
• Citation: 121 A.2d 188,209 Md. 354
• Parties: SUN CAB COMPANY, Inc., and Stanley P. Skiba, v. Bernice E. CUSICK and James B. Cusick, to the use of Bertha K. Meyer and Martin T. Meyer, trading as Theodore Meyer Estate, and Theodore H. Lewis.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

Page 354

209 Md. 354

121 A.2d 188

SUN CAB COMPANY, Inc., and Stanley P. Skiba, v. Bernice E. CUSICK and James B. Cusick, to the use of Bertha

K. Meyer and Martin T. Meyer, trading as Theodore

Meyer Estate, and Theodore H. Lewis.

No. 115.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

March 14, 1956.

Frederick J. Green, Jr., Baltimore (James J. Lindsay, Baltimore, on the brief), for appellants.

G. C. A. Anderson, Baltimore (Anderson, Barnes & Coe, Baltimore, on the brief), for appellees.

Before BRUNE, C. J., and DELAPLAINE, COLLINS, HENDERSON and HAMMOND, JJ.

DELAPLAINE, Judge.

This suit was entered in the Superior Court of Baltimore City by Bernice E. Cusick and James B. Cusick, her husband, to recover damages resulting from a collision of two automobiles at the intersection of Patterson Park Avenue and McElderry Street on April 6, 1953.

One of the automobiles, a Chevrolet taxicab, which was owned by Sun Cab Company, Inc., and operated by Stanley P. Skiba, its employee, was traveling north on Patterson Park Avenue, a through highway. The other car, owned by Bertha K. Meyer and Martin T. Meyer, trading as Theodore Meyer Estate, and operated by Theodore H. Lewis, was traveling west on McElderry Street.

The suit was brought against the owner and driver of the taxicab and the owners and driver of the other car. Mrs. Cusick, who was a passenger in the taxicab, sought recovery for the personal injuries she sustained in the collision. Her husband sought recovery for her medical expenses and loss of her services.

Skiba testified that he was driving at the rate of about 25 miles an hour, and that he first saw the other car when it was about a car length and a half on the other side of the stop sign. He then testified: 'When I saw him coming, * * * I figured he was going to stop, but he didn't. I was more than half way across the street. He caught me in the rear door and fender and turned me over.'

Lewis admitted that he had driven on McElderry Street before and knew that Patterson Park Avenue was a 'stop street.' Nevertheless he admitted: 'I didn't come to a complete stop. That is where I made a mistake.'

Officer Anthony Filipiak, of the Baltimore City Police Department, arriving on the scene about five minutes after the accident, found that the taxicab had made skid marks 80 feet long. He testified that the taxicab continued about 40 feet beyond the point of impact before it came to a stop.

The cab company and Skiba moved for directed verdicts. The Court overruled their motion, and the jury brought in both verdicts, one in favor of Mrs. Cusick for $15,000, and the other in favor of her husband for $2,500, against the owner and driver of the taxicab and the owners and driver of the other car.

The cab company and Skiba thereupon moved for judgments n. o. v. or for a new trial. The Court overruled that motion also and entered judgments on the verdicts. The cab company and Skiba then appealed from the judgments, which were subsequently entered to the use of Bertha K. Meyer and Martin T. Meyer, trading as Theodore Meyer Estate, and Theodore H. Lewis.

Appellants contended in this Court, as in the Court below, that there was no evidence of negligence on the part of Skiba legally sufficient to warrant submission of the case to the jury against them.

First. It was the contention of plaintiffs that Skiba was driving at an excessive speed. Lewis testified that the cab was going at 'a great rate of speed.' He admitted, however, that he did not see the cab until it was less than 6 feet from him. While Skiba claimed that he was driving at a speed of only 25 miles an hour, it might, of course, be inferred from the length of the skid marks that he was driving more rapidly than that.

But whatever was the speed of the cab, Lewis, being the unfavored driver, was required by the mandatory law of the State to stop and yield the right of way. The Maryland Motor Vehicle Law explicitly provides that a driver shall come to a full stop at the entrance to a through highway and shall yield the right of way to vehicles approaching on the through highway. Code 1951, art. 66 1/2, sec. 198.

As we have stated in previous cases, the purpose of this rule, known as the 'boulevard law,' is to expedite the movement of traffic within and between congested centers of population by setting aside certain highways over which traffic may move without interruption or delay. To accomplish this purpose, the statute dispenses with the right of way rules applicable to public highways generally and gives the right of way to all traffic on the through highway, and makes it the duty of every driver approaching such a highway, before entering it, to stop and yield the right of way to all vehicles approaching thereon. We have pointed out that the purpose of this statute would be frustrated if drivers on the through highway were required to slow down at each intersection.

The law is accordingly established in this State that where the driver of a motor vehicle enters a through highway in disregard of the boulevard law and collides with a vehicle traveling on the through highway, the collision can be attributed only to his negligence. It has been held that where the driver on an unfavored highway is about to enter a through highway designed to speed traffic, his duty to stop and to yield the right of way is so imperative that excessive speed of the driver on the through highway will ordinarily not be considered a contributing factor. Sun Cab Co. v. Faulkner, 163 Md. 477, 163 A. 194; Monumental Motor Tours v. Becker, 165 Md. 32, 166 A. 434; Blinder v. Monaghan, 171 Md. 77, 83, 84, 188 A. 31; Greenfeld v. Hook, 177 Md. 116, 125, 126, 8 A.2d 888, 136 A.L.R. 1485; Madge v. Fabrizio, 179 Md. 517, 523, 20 A.2d 172; Belle Isle Cab Co. v. Pruitt, 187 Md. 174, 182, 49 A.2d 537; State, to Use of Frizzell v. Gosnell, 197 Md. 381, 390, 79 A.2d 530; Ness v. Males, 201 Md. 235, 93 A.2d 541.

In the case at bar the driver of the taxicab had the right to assume that...