Baltimore Transit Co. v. Prinz

Prescott, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. The two appeals here involved arise out of actions for alleged negligence brought by Ruby Mae Prinz and Floy Kirkpatrick, plaintiffs below and. appellees here, against The Baltimore Transit Company, defendant below and appellant in this Court. A rear-end collision occurred between an automobile driven by the appellee, Prinz, in which the appellee, Kirkpatrick, was riding as a passenger, and a bus of the appellant. The cases were tried together before a jury; and, at the conclusion of the appellees’ evidence, the trial judge refused to grant a motion for a directed verdict offered by the appellant.

The appellant offered no testimony. The jury returned verdicts in favor of both of the appellees, and from the judgments entered upon said verdicts these appeals have been taken. In determining whether a defendant in this kind of a case was entitled to a directed verdict, we have repeatedly stated that all conflicts in the testimony must be resolved in favor of the plaintiffs and the Court assumes the truth of all evidence and such inferences as may naturally and legitimately be deduced therefrom which tend to support the plaintiffs’ right to recover. The evidence supports a finding of these facts.

On April 9, 1956, at approximately 9:00 p.m., the appellee, Ruby Mae Prinz, was operating her husband’s automobile in an easterly direction on Eastern Avenue, a boulevard street, in Baltimore County. She had with her, as a passenger, the other appellee, Mrs. Kirkpatrick. The weather was clear and dry; traffic was very light; and the street was straight in both directions from the scene of the accident and well illuminated. At the point of collision.

Eastern Avenue is about seventy ⁴⁰² feet wide with a median strip of 18 to 20 inches, dividing east and west bound traffic. Each half of this roadway is of sufficient width to accommodate three lanes of traffic. The southern lane next to the curb is considered as a parking lane, the middle lane as the slow lane, and the one next to the median as the fast lane. Mrs. Prinz was proceeding in the middle, or slow, lane at a speed between twenty-five and thirty miles per hour, when a dog stepped off the curb about sixty-five feet in front of her, and started to walk across her path.

At this time, the bus of the appellant was about fifty to seventy-five feet to her rear, traveling at a speed of thirty to thirty-five miles per hour. When Mrs. Prinz saw the dog step off the curb, she removed her foot from the accelerator and gradually slackened her speed for some thirty to fifty feet. She had “just touched” the brake when there was a heavy and severe impact from the rear, caused by the front of the bus colliding with the rear of the Prinz car. The Prinz car was equipped with brake lights, which were in working condition.

It was never brought to a stop before the collision, but its speed had been decelerated to about ten or fifteen miles an hour. The dog was unharmed, being some ten to fifteen feet in front of Mrs. Prinz at the time of the accident. The impact severely damaged the rear and broke the backs of the front seats of the passenger car (it being a type in which the front seats were collapsible so as to be made into a sleeping compartment), and both of the lady occupants were thrown backward, with no further control over the car. The car proceeded one hundred and sixty-two feet, where it was stopped by a stone wall.

The operator of the bus informed the officer who investigated the accident that Mrs. Prinz “slowed in front of him and he was unable to stop in time to avoid [the] accident.” I Under the above circumstances, the appellant first contends that as the evidence fails to establish any negligent act or omission on the part of the operator of the bus which caused the accident, the trial judge erred in refusing to with ⁴⁰³ draw the case from the consideration of the jury. It argues that as the mere happening of the rear-end collision is not of itself proof of negligence, the appellees are apparently relying upon such unproven acts as excessive speed, following too closely, and improper control and lookout. We find it only necessary to consider the last: improper control and lookout. In Maryland, we have adopted the general rule that every automobile driver must exercise toward other travelers upon the highways that degree of care which a person of ordinary prudence would exercise under similar circumstances.

It is universally recognized that negligence and reasonable care are relative terms and their application depends upon the situation of the parties and the degree of care and vigilance which circumstances reasonably impose. It is stated in Stevenson, Law of Negligence in the Atlantic States, sec. 6, that negligence and reasonable care derive their significance from a factual background, in which there must be evidence of circumstances which support a legitimate inference that in the exercise of reasonable care injury could have been avoided. See also, Holler v. Lowery, 175 Md. 149, 158 , 200 A. 353 ; Schell v. United Railways & Elect. Co., 144 Md. 527, 531 , 125 A. 158 .

We think in the case at bar that the factual background amply supports legitimate inferences by the jury that the operator of the bus did not have his vehicle under reasonable and proper control and/or he failed to maintain a proper lookout. It was not necessary that an eye-witness