Watts v. Peers

HART, J.

The action is for damages for the alleged negligent maiming of two horses belonging to the plaintiff. Judgment was awarded the plaintiff in the total sum of $334, which included the sum of $9 for expenditures made by plaintiff in the procurement of the medicine necessary to the treatment of the injured animals. The case was tried by the court without the aid of a jury. The defendants appeal from the judgment.

[452]

The defendant Robert Stewart Peers was, at the time of the filing of the complaint herein, a minor of the age of about nineteen years, and the defendant Robert A. Peers is the minor’s father. It is alleged in the complaint, and admitted by the answer, that upon an application in writing of Peers, Senior, prior to the accident in which the alleged injuries were inflicted upon the animals mentioned, the state division of motor vehicles issued to said minor a license authorizing him to operate a motor vehicle within the limits of the state of California, said application having also been signed by the defendant minor. It further appears that on the second day of January, 1925, at or about the hour of 5:35 P. M., the said defendant Robert Stewart Peers was in the act of driving or operating an automobile on the highway near a point about two miles in a general southerly direction from the town of Colfax, Placer County. The complaint alleges that the said automobile was at said time the property of the defendant Robert A. Peers “and was so being operated and driven by his said minor son” with his (the said Robert A. Peers’) assent. It is also alleged:

“That on said day, and at or about said hour, said plaintiff commenced to drive his two horses across the state highway opposite his home adjoining said highway, and at the aforementioned place, about two miles in a general southerly direction from the said City of Colfax, in said county and. state; that said plaintiff was at that time within the side boundary lines of said highway right of way and immediately in the rear of said horses; that as plaintiff so started said horses across said highway he looked and saw said motor vehicle approaching at a rapid pace; that said plaintiff then and there had a lighted lantern in his hand, and immediately upon seeing said motor vehicle approaching proceeded toward the center of said highway, driving said horses ahead of him and waving said lighted lantern to warn the driver or operator of said motor vehicle, to wit, the said Robert Stewart Peers, of the danger before him.