Court Summaries
| Jurisdiction | Wyoming,United States |
| Citation | Vol. 33 No. 1 Pg. 46 |
| Pages | 46 |
| Publication year | 2010 |
Vol. 33, No. 1, 46. Court Summaries
Issue: February, 2010
There are two appeals here. The Wyoming Supreme Court decided the first appeal above in the affirmative for Peter D. Brophy negating the need for a decision in the case entitled Peter D. Brophy v. Werner Enterprises, Inc., et al. This appeal was from a jury verdict where the jury awarded $18,069,257.00 to Peter D. Brophy out of a motor vehicle accident. The Wyoming Supreme Court affirmed.
From the opinion, it appears that fault and the facts surrounding fault were contested. For purposes of this summary the essential facts are not hugely significant. On July 25, 2006, Cheryl Neal was driving a semi-truck for Werner Enterprises, Inc. (hereinafter "Werner") southbound at the 1-25 interchange with 1-80 in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Mr. Brophy was traveling westbound in his automobile on 1-80. Mr. Brophy exited 1-80 proceeding toward southbound 1-25. The right front wheel of the semi-truck hit the left rear side of the BMW causing the BMW to spin. The spinning vehicle then was struck by another semi-truck. Mr. Brophy had two passengers in his vehicle. He suffered extensive injuries.
The first issue on appeal involved the jury instruction for failure to yield. Werner submitted an instruction "C" which quoted from Wyo. Stat. § 31-5-222(c) that "[i]f the driver is involved in a collision with . . .a vehicle in the intersection or junction of roadways, after driving past a yield sign without stopping, the collision shall be deemed prima facie evidence of his failure to yield the right-of-way." This instruction was not given by the trial court.
Werner argued that this instruction should have been given because Mr. Brophy was entering the 1-25 intersection wherein he was to yield to oncoming traffic and failure to do so is essentially prima facie evidence of his negligence. The trial court did give a fail to yield instruction "5" but it did not contain any of the presumption language found in "C." The Court concluded that it is an open question whether in Wyoming juries should be instructed on the presumption and other jurisdictions do not pave a clear path for adopting a rule that a jury should be instructed on a presumption. The Court ultimately concluded that the presumption instruction was not proper in this case because the facts on whether Mr. Brophy yielded or was required to yield were in such dispute that the instruction should not have been given. Legally, there was a challenge on whether the statute even applied to this interchange. Mr...
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