Moseley v. Hendricks: How North Carolina’s Supreme Court Applied Contributory Negligence in 2025

What Happened In Moseley V. Hendricks?

Plaintiff Glenn Moseley sued over eye injuries he sustained when a golf ball hit by defendant Johnny A. Hendricks Jr. struck him at a driving range operated by the City of Wilson. He brought negligence claims against both the golfer and the city. The record showed that when Mr. Moseley became exposed to the flight of Mr. Hendricks’s ball, he was intoxicated and distracted by his cell phone.

The trial court and then the Court of Appeals, in a 2024 decision reported at 292 N.C. App. 258, concluded that his own negligence barred the claims. The Supreme Court of North Carolina agreed to review the case, and on August 22, 2025, in an opinion written by Justice Allen (docket No. 63A24-1), it affirmed. A dissent was filed.

What Did The Supreme Court Of North Carolina Decide?

The Court held that Mr. Moseley was contributorily negligent as a matter of law. Its reasoning rested on the “open and obvious” principle it had applied a year earlier in Cullen v. Logan Developers, 386 N.C. 373 (2024): “The law expects individuals to take reasonable steps to protect themselves from open and obvious risks,” and “a condition is open and obvious if it would be detected by any ordinarily intelligent person using his eyes in an ordinary manner.” The flight of golf balls at a driving range, the Court reasoned, is that kind of risk.

Applying that standard, the Court found that Mr. Moseley’s lack of situational awareness, due at least in part to his intoxication and the distraction from his cell phone, constituted a failure to exercise ordinary care. Because he failed to take reasonable care for his own safety under the circumstances, the Court of Appeals had correctly held that contributory negligence barred his negligence claims against both defendants. The Court restated the settled rule that contributory negligence “arises from the duty that the law imposes on us all to take reasonable care to protect ourselves.”

Mr. Moseley also invoked the last clear chance doctrine, under which a plaintiff’s contributory negligence is not a bar if the defendant had time and opportunity to avoid the injury notwithstanding it. The Court rejected the argument because Mr. Hendricks “did not discover, nor should he have discovered, plaintiff’s position until after he had already hit the ball.” With no opportunity to avoid the harm, there was no last clear chance.

Why Does Moseley Matter For Every North Carolina Injury Claim?

Three facts decided the case, and all three show up constantly in ordinary injury claims: an open and obvious hazard, alcohol, and a phone. After Moseley, an adjuster who finds any one of them in your file has a Supreme Court opinion to cite. A driver who had two beers at dinner, a shopper who glanced at a text before stepping on a wet floor, a pedestrian who crossed mid-block while looking at directions, each will be described as a plaintiff who failed to exercise ordinary care for their own safety.

The decision also confirms that the Court’s 2024 open-and-obvious reasoning in Cullen v. Logan Developers, a premises case about an attic hole, applies beyond premises liability. Any activity with a visible risk, from a driving range to a highway shoulder, can be analyzed the same way. In a comparative-fault state that would reduce a recovery. In North Carolina it can end one, which is why the state’s contributory negligence rule, often called the “1% rule” as informal shorthand, remains the center of every claim.

• Open and obvious: if an ordinarily intelligent person using their eyes would have seen the danger, the law expects you to have avoided it.
• Intoxication: alcohol or drugs in the injured person’s system is treated as evidence of a failure to exercise ordinary care.
• Distraction: phone use at the moment of injury is now a headline fact, not a footnote.

How Does Moseley Apply To Car, Truck, And Slip-and-fall Claims?

In a North Carolina car accident claim, expect the other driver’s insurer to request your phone records and ask about alcohol in any recorded statement, then argue that a visible hazard, such as a slowing vehicle, a merging truck, or a stop sign, was open and obvious to you. The same playbook applies in truck accident and motorcycle accident cases, where carriers already lean on rider or driver conduct.

Premises cases are where Moseley and Cullen bite hardest. A North Carolina slip and fall claim now has to answer, from day one, whether the spill, the step, or the hole was something an ordinarily observant person would have seen. The answer often turns on lighting, sight lines, signage, and where a reasonable customer would have been looking, evidence that disappears within days unless someone preserves it.

What Did Moseley Not Change?

The decision applied existing law; it did not expand the defense. The burden of proof still sits with the defendant under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 1-139, and the defendant must still show that your negligence was a proximate cause of your injury, not merely that you were imperfect. The last clear chance doctrine still exists; it failed in Moseley on its facts, because the golfer had no chance to see the plaintiff before swinging, not because the Court narrowed it. Gross negligence and willful or wanton conduct by a defendant still defeat contributory negligence under Yancey v. Lea.

The statutory protections are untouched as well. Evidence that you were not wearing a seat belt remains inadmissible under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-135.2A(d), a motorcycle helmet violation is still not contributory negligence per se under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-140.4, and the rule of sevens still protects children. Every exception on our exceptions to contributory negligence page applied the day before Moseley and applies today.

How Do You Protect A North Carolina Claim After Moseley?

Assume the insurer will look for the three Moseley facts and get ahead of them. Seek medical care immediately so the records document your condition, including sobriety, at the time of the injury. Preserve your own phone records; a log showing no calls or texts in the minutes before a crash is powerful evidence, and it is far better to produce it than to have the other side subpoena it and characterize it. Photograph the scene from your point of view, at the same time of day, so a jury can judge for itself whether the hazard was really open and obvious.

Above all, do not give a recorded statement to the other side’s insurer. “Had you had anything to drink?” and “Were you on your phone?” are not background questions in North Carolina; after Moseley they are the questions the entire denial is built on. Refer the adjuster to your lawyer and let those facts be established by evidence rather than by an unguarded answer.

• Get medical treatment the same day and follow every recommendation.
• Save your phone’s call and message logs for the hour around the injury.
• Photograph sight lines, lighting, and warning signs before anything changes.
• Identify witnesses who can describe what was and was not visible.
• Route every insurer contact through your attorney.