Boob v. Fisher

Per Curiam. Henley Collins, a passenger on a truck driven by Leonard K. Fisher, was injured when that vehicle entered a dust cloud on a road and struck the rear of a tractor, with a road sweeper attachment, operated by Morris Boob, an employee of the Interstate Amiesite Corp. After having received Workmen’s ²⁸⁰ Compensation payments from his employer’s compensation carrier, American Motorists Insurance Company, Collins instituted this action in ,his own behalf and to the use of that insurance carrier against Fisher, Boob and Boob’s employer Interstate Amiesite Corporation. The case was tried before the Circuit Court for Howard County (Macgill, J.) and a jury, and resulted in a verdict and judgment in favor of the plaintiff against the three defendants. At the close of the plaintiff’s case the defendants offered a motion for a directed verdict which was overruled; and at the close of the entire case these motions were renewed and were again denied.

Only the defendants Boob and Interstate Amiesite Corporation appeal. They contend (a) that there was no showing that negligence on their part was a proximate cause of the accident, and (b) that their requested instruction to the effect that any liability on their part was dependent upon the defendant Boob negligently having created the dust cloud and having had actual or constructive knowledge of the road hazard created thereby, was erroneously refused. It appears clear to this court, however, that neither of these contentions has merit. The jury had before it evidence which, if believed, tended to show that the road sweeping apparatus which the appellant Boob was operating half on the road and half on the dirt shoulder (sweeping both the road and the dirt shoulder) moving at a speed of from one to one and a half miles per hour, had enveloped itself in a cloud of dust, that the apparatus could not be seen by motorists who were behind it because of this heavy cloud and that Boob should have had knowledge of the hazard to motorists thereby created, and should have posted signs or a flagman on the road indicating the