Jessica Renee Tutor
v.
Jack Sines and Devan Frazier
No. 1210037
Supreme Court of Alabama
February 17, 2023
Appeal from Russell Circuit Court (CV-18-900230)
MITCHELL, JUSTICE.
Jessica Renee Tutor was driving three passengers in her automobile when she hit another vehicle head-on. Two of the passengers,
Jack Sines and Devan Frazier, were injured and later sued Tutor in the Russell Circuit Court. The case went to trial solely on Sines's and Frazier's claims of wantonness, and the jury found in their favor. The trial court then entered judgment against Tutor. She appealed. We now affirm.
Facts and Procedural History
One clear Sunday afternoon, Tutor began driving three passengers in her car from her home in Fort Mitchell, Alabama, to Columbus, Georgia. Her passengers were Sines and Frazier ("the plaintiffs") and Brendan Caulder, who is not a party to this suit. After leaving her house, Tutor eventually turned north onto Highway 165, which had one northbound lane and two southbound lanes. The northbound and southbound lanes were separated by double lines. The northbound lane proceeded over a hill that obscured a church on the west side of the road and, at the bottom of the hill, a railroad crossing. Tutor was driving over the speed limit, despite requests from her passengers to slow down.
As she was approaching the crest of the hill, Tutor saw another northbound car in front of her, driven by Shane Argo. Sines asked Tutor to change the song playing in the car, at which point Tutor took her eyes
off the road and began to use her mobile phone, which was controlling the music. Caulder, seated behind the front passenger seat, saw that Tutor was looking down at her phone and shouted at her to slow down. She looked up and saw that she was about to rear-end Argo's car, which had slowed to a halt behind another car that was turning left into the church parking lot. Tutor turned sharply to the left and glanced the bumper of Argo's car before careening into the southbound lanes. She collided head-on with another vehicle, injuring the plaintiffs.
The plaintiffs sued Tutor for negligence and wantonness. Tutor moved for summary judgment. Citing Alabama's guest-passenger statute, § 32-1-2, Ala. Code 1975, which bars negligence but not wantonness claims in certain circumstances, the trial court granted the motion with respect to the negligence claims but denied it as to the wantonness claims.
The parties then went to trial solely on the plaintiffs' claims of wantonness. At the conclusion of the plaintiffs' case-in-chief, Tutor moved for judgment as a matter of law, and the trial court denied the motion. She again moved for judgment as a matter of law at the conclusion of all the evidence before the case was submitted to the jury,
and the trial court again denied her motion. The jury returned a verdict in favor of the plaintiffs and against Tutor, awarding Sines $500,000 and Frazier $100. Tutor then filed a renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law, arguing that the evidence was not sufficient to submit the claims to the jury. The trial court denied the motion and entered judgment against Tutor. She timely appealed.
Standard of Review
We review de novo a trial court's denial of a motion for judgment as a matter of law to determine "'"whether there was substantial evidence, when viewed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, to produce a factual conflict warranting jury consideration."'" Protective Life Ins. Co. v. Apex Parks Grp., LLC, 322 So.3d 1027, 1038-39 (Ala. 2020) (citations omitted). "[S]ubstantial evidence is evidence of such weight and quality that fair-minded persons in the exercise of impartial judgment can reasonably infer the existence of the fact sought to be proved." West v. Founders Life Assurance Co. of Florida, 547 So.2d 870, 871 (Ala. 1989); see also § 12-21-12(d), Ala. Code 1975.
Analysis
The sole issue in this appeal is whether the plaintiffs presented substantial evidence that Tutor was driving wantonly at the time of the collision. We agree with the trial court that evidence of Tutor's wantonness was substantial, and thus the issue was properly submitted to the jury.
"'"'Wantonness is not merely a higher degree of culpability than negligence. Negligence and wantonness, plainly and simply, are qualitatively different tort concepts of actionable culpability.'"'" Ex parte Essary, 992 So.2d 5, 9 (Ala. 2007) (citations omitted). Wantonness is "[c]onduct which is carried on with a reckless or conscious disregard of the rights or safety of others." § 6-11-20(b)(3), Ala. Code 1975. It requires "'the conscious doing of some act or the omission of some duty while knowing of the existing conditions and being conscious that, from doing or omitting to do an act, injury will likely or probably result.'" Lands v. Ward, 349 So.3d 219, 229 (Ala. 2021) (quoting Essary, 992 So.2d at 9).
"Absent some evidence of impaired judgment, such as from the consumption of alcohol, we do not expect an individual to engage in self-destructive behavior." Essary, 992 So.2d at 12. But some acts are "so
inherently reckless that we might otherwise impute to [the defendant] a depravity consistent with disregard of instincts of safety and self-preservation." Id. That is, when a defendant's allegedly wanton conduct toward others would also endanger the defendant, the evidence must support finding that the defendant's wantonness extended to her own safety. Id.
The record before us contains substantial evidence from which the jury could have found that Tutor acted wantonly by (1) intentionally violating the speed limit (2) while actively engaging with her mobile phone while driving (3) with knowledge that her actions constituted a risk of probable harm to herself and her passengers. We address below the evidence that supports this finding.
A. Substantial Evidence of Speeding
In an automobile accident, "while speed alone does not amount to wantonness, speed, coupled with other circumstances, may amount to wantonness." Hicks v. Dunn, 819 So.2d 22, 24 (Ala. 2001). In Hicks, this Court found substantial evidence of wantonness on facts similar to those here. Id. Dunn, the defendant in Hicks, had crested a hill while driving and saw the Hickses' vehicle stopped and waiting to turn into a
restaurant 100 feet or less in front of him. Id. at 23. Dunn applied his brakes, but, he testified, when he saw the Hickses' vehicle, it was too late to stop. Id. His truck struck the Hickses' vehicle, injuring them. Id. The Hickses sued, and the trial court entered judgment as a matter of law on their wantonness claim.
The Hicks Court found that several pieces of evidence entitled the jury to find that Dunn had acted wantonly. Id. at 25. First, Dunn was traveling at a speed somewhere between the speed limit of 40 and 65 miles per hour. Id. at 23. Second, Dunn testified that he did not notice the functioning blinker and brake lights on the Hickses' vehicle. Id. Third, construction signs were posted along the road leading up to the restaurant, and there was evidence that the road was in a "residential-type area." Id. Finally, Dunn knew that the restaurant was...
