ANNIE MILLER MOLINARO ET AL., APPELLANTS,
v.
SCOTT BROTHERS, INC., A CORPORATION, APPELLEE
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The court held that the trial judge correctly determined that uncontradicted evidence rebutted the presumption of ownership and operation, thus no case for the jury was presented.
Appellants were involved in an automobile accident with a truck bearing the defendant company's name. The defendant proved the truck was leased to and…
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PRETTYMAN, Circuit Judge.
Our appellants Molinaro filed in the District Court for the District of Columbia a civil action based upon an automobile accident in Pennsylvania. The evidence showed that the name of the defendant company was painted on the side of the truck which was in collision with appellants’ car. The defendant, however, proved the truck had been leased by it to the Pennsylvania Railroad, was being driven by a regular employee of that Railroad, and was on exclusively Railroad business. That proof was in the form of documents and oral testimony. It was uneontradicted. The Molinaros relied upon a presumption of Pennsylvania law, which is that, where the name of a company is painted on the side of a vehicle, the company is presumed to be the owner and operator of the vehicle.
The Molinaros say that Pennsylvania cases hold the presumption strong enough to take a case to the jury even in the face of uneontradicted evidence contrary to the presumption. In the present case the trial judge let the case go to the jury, and it found for the Molinaros. He then set the verdict aside and gave judgment for the defendant.
The trial judge held the presumption of the Pennsylvania law, being a matter of substance, must be applied, but that the evidentiary situation upon which must depend his' decision whether a case for the jury, had been made out, being a procedural matter, is controlled by the law of the forum.1 He concluded that the overwhelming and uncontradicted evidence demolished the presumption and left no case for the jury. We find no error in his judgment.
Affirmed.
. Tobin v. Pennsylvania R. Co., D.C.Cir. 1938, 69 App.D.C. 262, 100 F. 2d 435, certiorari denied, 1939, 306 U.S. 640, 59 S.Ct. 488, 83 L.Ed. 1040; Boland v. Love, D.C.Cir.1955, 95 U.S.App.D.C. 337, 341, 222 F. 2d 27, 31.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- Frend v. United States, 306 U.S. 640 (U.S. 1939)
- Boland v. Love, 222 F.2d 27 (D.C. Cir. 1955)
- Tobin v. Pa. R. Co., 100 F.2d 435 (D.C. Cir. 1938)