Judgment of the Court
J.-In the village of Sillery near Quebec city, a truck belonging to the respondent struck and seriously injured appellant's wife who at the time was attempting to cross the road. The appellant, who is common as to property with his wife, as chief of the community, instituted the present action in which he claims $13,495.68. The trial judge awarded him $6,970.18, but the Court of King's Bench reduced this amount to $3,485.09 on the ground that there was contributory negligence.
The liability of the respondent cannot be questioned. The trial judge found that the truck driven by an employee of the Highway Department was going at an unreasonable rate of speed in the village of Sillery, at a time when the traffic was heavy, thus endangering the safety of pedestrians. The Court of King's Bench reached the same conclusion, and this concurrent finding of facts relieves us of the duty of dealing any further with this point.
But the Court of King's Bench thought that the imprudence of appellant's wife in crossing the road contributed to the accident in such a way, and to such an extent, that the liability of the respondent should be reduced by fifty per cent.
With great respect, I believe that this appeal should be allowed and the judgment at the trial restored. The sole and determining cause of the accident was the speed at which the truck was driven, and the failure of respondent's employee to exercise a proper control over his truck and bring it to a stop in order to avoid hitting appellant's wife. The preponderance of the evidence, and the trial judge so found, is to the effect that when the victim proceeded to cross the street with her friend, there was no obstruction on the highway in the immediate vicinity. In order to cross the road, the victim had to walk approximately twenty feet, and before doing so, she looked to her right and to her left to make sure that the road was clear and that she could go ahead in all safety.
Seeing nothing coming, she had the right to assume that no driver, in violation of the law of the road and of the most elementary prudence, in this village of Sillery which has been termed by respondent's driver himself, as a "dangerous place". would emerge at such a rate of speed and imperil her life, before she had finished crossing the road.