Morris v. State of California

Opinion

COBEY, Acting P. J.

Plaintiffs, Marian and James Earl Morris, husband and wife, appeal from a judgment of dismissal of their personal

[964]

injury action against the State of California made and entered following the sustaining, without leave to amend, of the state’s general demurrer to those causes of action in plaintiffs’ second amended complaint applicable to the state.

1

In this pleading plaintiffs alleged, among other things, that on or about September 6, 1975, at approximately 11:30 p.m., on the state’s Golden State Freeway between Peoria and Lankershim in the City of Los Angeles,

2

a 1973 Lincoln Continental, owned and operated negligently by defendant, Ruby MacDonald, came through a badly damaged stretch of the freeway’s median barrier between the lines of traffic moving in opposite directions and collided with a 1972 Dodge to its damage, owned and operated with due care by plaintiff, James Earl Morris, and also occupied by plaintiff, Marian Morris, who was severely injured in the collision. Plaintiffs further alleged that at the site of the collision the median barrier consisted only of two wire ropes hanging limply on the ground for many yards because of the damage the barrier had sustained in a previous accident which defendant, state Department of Transportation, had failed to repair, notwithstanding presumed notice thereof from the reports of the California Highway Patrol and possibly from its own maintenance crews then working in the area of the collision. Plaintiffs finally alleged that this unrepaired gap in the median barrier constituted a dangerous condition of the freeway which proximately caused (at least in part) the collision and the injuries and damages resulting therefrom to plaintiffs and to their Dodge.

Governmental monetary liability in tort in this state is exclusively statutory in origin. (See Gov. Code, §§ 814, 815, subd. (a)) and the legis. committee com. to § 815, subd. (a), Deerings Ann. Gov. Code (1973 ed.) p. 117;

Susman

v.

City of Los Angeles