Males v. Davidson

Marbury, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court. These suits were brought in the Baltimore City Court by the appellants, an infant and her father, for damages to her, for her medical expenses, and for the loss of services to her father, as a result of an automobile accident. At the conclusion of plaintiffs’ cases (tried together), the trial court granted a motion for a directed verdict in favor of the defendant on the ground that there was no legally sufficient evidence of primary negligence on the part of the defendant, and on the ground that the infant plaintiff was guilty of contributory negligence as a matter of law. From the judgments entered on these verdicts, the plaintiffs have appealed.

The accident occurred on Harford Road in the town of Carney in Baltimore County, at a point south of ²⁹⁸ Chenoak Avenue. Harford Road at that point is 46 feet wide. The date of the accident was May 8, 1949, at which time the plaintiff, Clarice Males, was nearly fourteen years old, her fourteenth birthday being on July 17. She left a cooking class which she had been attending on Chenoak Avenue, west of Harford Road, about 5 P. M., and started to go home.

She did not attempt to cross Harford Road at the intersection of Chenoak Avenue, but walked across a vacant lot which was at the southwest corner of this intersection, and, when she had reached a point some distance south of Chenoak Avenue, she started to cross. She saw a truck, followed by several automobiles, in the westernmost, or slow, lane of southbound traffic. She said she looked both ways and started to cross in front of the truck. After she had passed the truck, she was struck by the automobile driven by the appellee, which apparently was passing the truck, or running parallel to it.

She said she was in the middle of the street when something suddenly hit her. She did not look after she left the curb, and she did not see the car that hit her. The weather was clear and the streets were dry, and it was daylight. The Baltimore County officer who first arrived at the scene of the accident found the victim lying in the road, 20 feet from the west side of Harford Road, and about 4 feet from the center yellow line.

There was a single skid mark from the location of the body to the defendant’s car, which mark was 19 feet 8 inches long. There was a 30-mile speed limit at that point. The defendant’s car had stopped at the point where the skid mark ended, and the defendant told the officer that he was passing the truck which he thought had just parked, and that he struck the pedestrian with his left front fender, bumper and hood. He said he did not see her come out from the west side of the street, but that she came from in front of the truck.

The officer said there was no indication that the defendant’s car had gone over the center line,- the skid marks being all on the inner, or fast, southbound lane. The officer testified something about ²⁹⁹ a 50-foot skid mark north of the place where the victim was found, but he was not sure about this, and could not connect this with