Opinion
NO. 2011 CA 2299
11-02-2012
EDGAR L BROWN, JR. v. SANDY E. CARBO AND LOUISIANA FARM BUREAU CASUALTY INSURANCE COMPANY
JEFFREY M. HEGGELUND DONALDSONVILLE, LA ATTORNEY FOR PLAINTIFF-1th APPELLANT EDGAR L. BROWN, JR. CHRISTOPHER W. STIDHAM BATON ROUGE, LA ATTORNEY FOR DEFENDANTS-2ND APPELLANTS LOUISIANA FARM BUREAU CASUALTY INSURANCE COMPANY AND SANDY E. CARBO
NOT DESIGNATED FOR PUBLICATION
Appealed from the
18th Judicial District Court
in and for the Parish of Iberville, Louisiana
Trial Court No. 66,204
Honorable J. Robin Free, Judge
JEFFREY M. HEGGELUND
DONALDSONVILLE, LA
ATTORNEY FOR
PLAINTIFF-1th APPELLANT
EDGAR L. BROWN, JR.
CHRISTOPHER W. STIDHAM
BATON ROUGE, LA
ATTORNEY FOR
DEFENDANTS-2ND APPELLANTS
LOUISIANA FARM BUREAU
CASUALTY INSURANCE
COMPANY AND
SANDY E. CARBO
BEFORE: KUHN, PETTIGREW, AND McDONALD, JJ.
PETTIGREW , J.
Following a bench trial, the parties challenge the trial court's dismissal of the plaintiffs personal injury action and the defendants' reconventional demand, both of which arose from a motor vehicle accident. We affirm.
FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
Plaintiff, Edgar L. Brown, Jr., filed suit to recover damages sustained in a September 28, 2007 accident on Highway 75 in Plaquemine, Louisiana. Mr. Brown was traveling northbound on Highway 75 at the time in question. At about the same time, Sandy E. Carbo had been visiting her brother at Carbo's Seafood, a family-owned business located on Highway 75. According to the record, Ms. Carbo left Carbo's Seafood and was backing out of the parking lot of the establishment with the intention of proceeding southbound on Highway 75. The parties gave conflicting accounts of where the actual collision occurred, i.e., which lane of Highway 75.
Mr. Brown filed suit against Ms. Carbo and her insurer, Louisiana Farm Bureau Casualty Insurance Company ("Farm Bureau"). Farm Bureau subsequently filed a reconventional demand against Mr. Brown and his insurer, Allstate Insurance Company, for reimbursement of the payments Farm Bureau made to Ms. Carbo for the damage to her vehicle. The matter proceeded to a one-day bench trial on May 12, 2010, at which time documentary evidence was introduced Into the record, and the trial court heard testimony from the parties and two other fact witnesses, including Deputy Matthew Wolfe, the Iberville Parish Sheriffs Office deputy who investigated the accident. At the conclusion of the trial, the trial court concluded it was unable to determine who was at fault.
This is probably -- I don't have many of these, but this is one that I have where I can tell you I don't know what happened. I can't tell you for sure which way it went. The only semblance of physical evidence is the set of marks in some gravel. ... So now I have her saying it happened in my lane, him saying I didn't cross over in her lane, and they both appear to be very credible people. What I believe happened is that I don't believe either one of them knows what happened ....The trial court signed a judgment on June 2,2010, dismissing Mr. Brown's suit and Farm Bureau's reconventiona! demand. Mr. Brown filed a timely motion for new trial, which was denied by the trial court. Thereafter, both Mr. Brown and Farm Bureau appealed, each arguing the trial court erred in finding that they did not carry their burden of proof.
I asked myself on both of their steads [sic], to him coming down the road, how do you not see a vehicle backing up into your lane of travel, all you know is you hit them, you don't know how it got there. And on her
side, I said, how do you look down that road backing up, you're telling me I can see clearly, and that's ail I know is we hit. He didn't materialize there through some type of Star-Trek vaporization. So both of y'all missed something obviously. To me that's obvious, both parties missed something.
That being the case, I can't say which way this happened. And because of that, I can't rule for the plaintiff or for the plaintiff-in-reconvention because I can't say who is at fault here, I don't know. ... I don't know what lane it happened in, that's the problem.
It is well-settled that a reviewing court may not disturb the factual findings of the trier of fact in the absence of manifest error. Rosell v. ESCO, 549 So.2d 840, 844 (La. 1989); Arceneaux v. Domingue, 365 So.2d 1330, 1333 (La. 1978). In Arceneaux, we set forth a two-part test for the appellate review of facts: (1) the appellate court must find from the record that there is a reasonable factual basis for the finding of the trial court, and (2) the appellate court must further determine that the record establishes the finding is not clearly wrong or manifestly erroneous. Arceneaux, 365 So.2d at 1333. Under the manifest error-clearly wrong standard, the reviewing court does not decide whether the trier of fact was right or wrong, but whether the fact finder's conclusion was a reasonable one. Stobart v. State through Dept. of Transp. and Development, 617 So.2d 880, 882 (La. 1993). Thus, "[i]f the [fact finder's] findings are reasonable in light of the record reviewed in its entirety, the court of appeal may not reverse, even though convinced that had it been sitting as the trier of fact, it would have weighed the evidence differently." Sistler v. Liberty Mutual Ins. Co., 558 So.2d 1106, 1112 (La. 1990).
In vehicular collision disputes such as this, both parties have the burden of proving their cases by a preponderance of the evidence. If either litigant fails to satisfy his burden, "he necessarily loses." Miller v. Leonard, 588 So.2d 79, 81 (La. 1991). In Miller, the supreme court further recognized "[w]here the evidence is truly in equipoise and neither of the opposing plaintiffs satisfies the burden of proof," the trial court may dismiss both suits. Id. at 83. Thus, the central issue presented on appeal is whether the trial court manifestly erred in finding neither side proved the other's negligence.
Two opposing versions of the manner in which the accident occurred developed at trial. Mr. Brown contended that his truck was in the northbound lane of Highway 75 at the point of impact. He stated that he did not see Ms. Carbo's truck until she was in his lane and the two vehicles collided. Mr. Brown asserted he did not have time to apply his brakes, adding there was "nothing [he] could have done" to avoid the accident. Mr. Brown was adamant in his trial testimony that he never crossed the center line of the highway.
Ms. Carbo testified to a completely different version of how the accident occurred. She indicated that she was backing up at an angle from the parking lot of Carbo's Seafood and never saw Mr. Brown's truck coming. At the point of impact, Ms. Carbo stated that she was in the southbound lane of Highway 75, with her front tires still in the gravel of the parking lot. She further testified that she found a busted brake light and mud from her truck in the southbound lane following the accident.
The investigating officer's testimony was inconclusive. Deputy Matthew Wolfe responded to the accident on the night in question. According to Deputy Wolfe, he spoke to both drivers and observed the two vehicles for damage. He did not recall seeing any debris in the roadway following the accident. Deputy Wolfe testified that he saw tire marks in the loose gravel of the parking lot at Carbo's Seafood, adding that it looked like a "car had been dragged or shifted." When questioned further about these tire marks, Deputy Wolfe acknowledged that the tire marks could have been made by other vehicles in the parking lot or could have been created by the action of Ms. Carbo turning her wheel to back out of the parking lot.
With regard to how the accident happened, Deputy Wolfe indicated that Ms. Carbo "advised she was backing out of Carbo's Seafood when she was struck by another vehicle coming northbound." When Deputy Wolfe questioned Mr. Brown at the scene of the accident, Mr. Brown "said he was unsure" about what happened. However, two weeks later Mr. Brown gave a written statement detailing his recollection of the accident, wherein Mr. Brown indicated that he was in the northbound lane of Highway 75 when Ms. Carbo's truck backed onto the highway and crossed into his lane.
In reviewing this matter, we find the trial court very closely and carefully considered all of the evidence presented. The trial court was confronted with two different versions of the accident and also with the fact that there was no eye witness to the accident other than the drivers themselves, With the absence of any physical evidence to substantiate either version, the trial court concluded it was unable to determine in what manner the accident actually occurred. The trial court was unable to discredit either party's version. Faced with this dilemma, the trial court determined that neither party succeeded in carrying its burden of proving the negligence of the other party and dismissed both the main demand and the reconventional demand. Likewise, we have thoroughly reviewed the record before us and find no error in the trial court's judgment. We conclude that the evidence in the record reasonably supports the trial court's finding that neither party satisfied their burden of proof.
For the above and foregoing reasons, we affirm the trial court's June 2, 2010 judgment and assess all costs associated with this appeal equally between Mr. Brown and Farm Bureau.