Staples v. L. W. Blinn Lumber Co.

STEPHENS, J.,

pro

tem.

The plaintiff below, who is the respondent here, was the owner and operator of a garage located on the westerly side of a main thoroughfare known as Harbor Boulevard, which runs from the center of the city of Los Angeles to the harbor. The garage was set back from the pavement line something like ten feet. About even with the southerly wall of the building, but on the street line, is a small restaurant or barbecue stand. A Paige automobile, used as a tow-car in connection with the business of the garage, was standing in front of and close to the garage. The Riverside-Redondo Boulevard, sometimes called the Compton-Redondo Boulevard, crosses Har

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bor Boulevard just a few feet north of the garage herein referred to. Defendant’s lumber truck with trailer was traveling southerly along the westerly side of Harbor Boulevard, and while in the intersection of the two boulevards referred to an automobile with trailer, coming up from the rear, attempted to and did pass the truck on its left side. Other cars at the time were approaching the intersection from the south, and still others were a short distance back of the automobile and trailer. The automobile with trailer swerved back into its right side, of the road too quickly to completely clear the truck, and the right side of the trailer struck the left front hub of the truck. The latter vehicle left the pavement, turned to the right and, describing an arc, plunged head-on into the Paige car, damaging it as well as two Ford cars not belonging to plaintiff, standing just within the garage.

Plaintiff recovered judgment in the superior court for the damages to all three cars, with damages for certain business losses occasioned by the wreck of the tow-car. Defendant has appealed to this court and asks a reversal of the judgment on the ground that no negligence on the part of defendant was shown, and further, that since the two Ford cars did not belong to plaintiff, he could not recover for their damage without showing an assignment of interest to him. It may be stated without further consideration that plaintiff has shown no right to recover for the damage to the Fords. We shall next consider the question of negligence.

Plaintiff bases his claim of negligence upon two points: (1) that the truck was traveling faster than the law allows, and (2) that the truck’s steering-wheel was not the proper size for the handling of the machine in such an emergency. Several witnesses, driving along the highway at the time, place the truck’s speed at the rate of ten to fifteen miles per hour immediately before it was struck by the trailer. Plaintiff testified that he did not see the truck leave the pavement but did see it just before it hit the Paige ear. He estimated the speed of the truck at about eighteen or twenty miles per hour. He heard no brakes applied and saw no skid marks. The truck driver told him that rather than run into the barbecue stand, where there were women and children, he had turned into the garage. The land in the vicinity of the accident slopes from the pavement downward