Krebs v. Corrigan
321 A.2d 558 (1974)
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Rule of Law:
The doctrine of res ipsa loquitur can be applied when the instrumentality causing an injury is the defendant's own body, permitting an inference of negligence if the body is under the defendant's exclusive control and the accident is of a type that would not ordinarily occur in the absence of negligence.
Facts:
- Plaintiff, an artist who creates plexiglass sculptures, discovered defendant Bronson in his studio with a station wagon.
- Bronson had parked his car inside the studio without permission to fix some dents.
- Plaintiff gave Bronson a dent-removing tool to speed up the work and asked him to remove the car as soon as possible.
- Plaintiff then walked to a nearby wall to answer a ringing telephone.
- While on the phone, Plaintiff glanced over and saw Bronson 'flying through the air at least three feet off the ground.'
- Bronson landed in the middle of a sculpture, destroying it and three others.
Procedural Posture:
- Plaintiff sued defendant Bronson for negligence and defendant Donald Corrigan for vicarious liability in the trial court.
- At the conclusion of the plaintiff’s case in chief during the trial, defendants moved for a directed verdict.
- The trial court judge granted the defendants' motion, reasoning that the plaintiff could not show what caused Bronson’s body to fall onto the sculptures.
- Plaintiff, as appellant, appealed the directed verdict to the reviewing appellate court.
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Issue:
Does the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur apply to permit an inference of negligence when a plaintiff cannot explain why the defendant's body, which was under his exclusive control, flew through the air and damaged the plaintiff's property?
Opinions:
Majority - Yeagley, Associate Judge
Yes. The doctrine of res ipsa loquitur applies to permit an inference of negligence under these circumstances. The court reasoned that the three conditions for res ipsa loquitur were met. First, the cause of the accident was known—Bronson's body striking the sculptures; the trial court improperly confused the 'cause' of the accident with the 'manner' in which it occurred. Second, the accident-producing instrumentality—Bronson's body—was within his exclusive control. Third, human bodies do not ordinarily go crashing into property without negligence on the part of the person in control. The court explicitly rejected the notion that res ipsa loquitur cannot apply when the instrumentality is a human body and also held that a plaintiff need not call the defendant as an adverse witness before invoking the doctrine, as doing so would undermine its purpose of addressing situations where the defendant has superior knowledge of the event.
Analysis:
This decision clarifies and expands the application of res ipsa loquitur by explicitly holding that a defendant's own body can serve as the 'instrumentality' of harm. It establishes a significant precedent for cases involving bizarre accidents where the defendant's actions are inexplicable to the plaintiff. The ruling reinforces the distinction between the 'cause' of an accident and the 'manner' in which it occurred, preventing lower courts from denying the doctrine's use simply because the specific reason for the defendant's negligent act is unknown. This lowers the plaintiff's initial burden of proof in such unusual negligence cases, shifting the onus to the defendant to provide an explanation for their actions.
