Arundel v. Turk

ROTH, J.,

pro tem.

This appeal is from a judgment entered upon a directed verdict. The evidence shows that

[164]

appellant Sarah Arundel, plaintiff in the trial court, driving a Dodge six sedan, had completed a left turn from Ocean Park Boulevard into Main Street, public streets in the city of Ocean Park, California, and proceeded in a southerly direction on Main Street in second gear for approximately fifty to seventy-five feet, at a speed between twelve and fourteen miles per hour. According to her testimony and that of two eye-witnesses, her automobile was proceeding on her right side of the street parallel and a few feet to the west of a mythical center line in the street, when a Durant coupe, which respondent was driving at a speed of twenty to-twenty-five miles per hour from the south to the north on the same street, angled to the west of said mythical center line, whereupon the left front sides of the automobiles in question collided. Appellant and the two eye-witnesses mentioned testified that the actual, impact took place on the appellant’s part of the roadway, that is, west of the center. The testimony is undisputed, however, that when the cars came to rest the Durant was eight to ten feet east of the center of the street, and the whole of appellant’s Dodge with the exception of the right rear wheel, was east of the center and impacted at an angle of five degrees, using the center of the street as a base, left front to left front with the Durant. The evidence also showed that there were no automobiles to the right of appellant, and that she could have operated her Dodge closer to the curb.

Respondent persuaded the trial court and reiterates now that because of the undisputed physical evidence showing the positions of the two cars when they had come to rest after the impact, any testimony to the effect that the actual collision took place west of the center of the street was opposed to the laws of nature, and is so incredible that such testimony is unworthy of belief by any reasonable person, and is therefore no evidence at all.

(Waizman

v.

Black,

101 Cal. App. 610 [281 Pac. 1087];