Bugg v. Carpenter

Hammond, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court. Pink Bugg is an elderly litigious man of varied interests, one of which is the driving of a taxi in Cecil County. In Bugg v. Trs, Cokesbury Baptist Ch., 252 Md. 59 -60, we said, referring to two prior cases: “Appellant (Pink Bugg) can hardly be called an habitué of this Court but it seems safe to say he has achieved the status of a frequent visitor.” One of the prior cases was Bugg v. Brown, 251 Md. 99 , in which Bugg sued fellow taxi drivers Brown, Cash and Carpenter for assaulting and severely beating him one night in October 1964. No evidence was produced against Brown, and Judge Mackey directed a verdict for Cash and Carpenter on the ground that Bugg ¹⁶² had shown no damages.

We reversed, holding that Bugg had made out a prima facie case against both Cash and Carpenter. When the case was retried, Bugg tried his own case with considerable help from Judge Roney, indeed, as much help as judicial propriety permitted. Bugg’s version of the incident was that Cash became annoyed when Bugg announced he would not work the next day and was looking for a replacement and that Cash grabbed him by the neck, lifted him off the ground and kicked him on the leg. Bugg called the State police.

This so irritated Carpenter that, according to Bugg, he told Bugg he would do his “damnedest” to kill him. In performing this promise, Carpenter, says Bugg, hit him on the face and then knocked him down three times. The version of Cash and Carpenter as to what first occurred was well set forth in the opening paragraph of the opinion in the first appeal: “The altercation which provoked this litigation took place shortly after midnight on 19 October 1964 at the Whistle Stop in Perryville, Cecil County. The appellant (Bugg) and the appellees Cash and Carpenter, sitting in their taxicabs, were awaiting the arrival, on the late buses, of sailors returning to the Naval Training Station at Bainbridge, 3 miles distant.

Cash was first in line; Carpenter was next; Bugg was further back. When the first bus arrived Bugg, contrary to the prevailing custom, ‘shot up, cut everybody off,