We granted certiorari to the Court of Appeals in Dunagan v. State , 286 Ga. App. 668 649 SE2d 765 2007, to consider whether defendant Dunagan’s proffered evidence regarding the design of the intersection at which the collision at issue occurred was properly excluded. Finding that the exclusion of the proffered evidence was error, we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals. The evidence as set forth in the opinion by the Court of Appeals, was the following: on February 17, 2004, Aaron Dunagan was driving his truck south on a highway when he approached an intersection; the posted speed limit was 65 miles per hour; warning signs of the approaching intersection were posted approximately 700 feet north of it; before he reached the intersection, the light directed at the north and south lanes of the highway changed from green to yellow; Dunagan then accelerated through the intersection, running what had become a red light, and struck a sports utility vehicle “SUV” attempting to turn left in front of him on its passenger side; Dunagan told a state trooper at the scene that “I tried to beat the light and didn’t make it”; although the driver of the struck SUV was unconscious at the scene, Dunagan was able to leave his vehicle without assistance; he had been drinking beer earlier in the day, smelled of alcohol, and showed signs of impairment on field sobriety tests administered at the scene; he also tested positive on two different alco-sensors; after Dunagan was arrested, he refused the State-administered alcohol test; the victim suffered severe brain damage and other injuries, is a quadriplegic, and is unable to speak or eat; a jury found Dunagan guilty of reckless driving, running a red light, and serious injury by vehicle based on reckless driving;1 and Dunagan was sentenced as a recidivist.
On appeal to the Court of Appeals, Dunagan argued, inter alia, that the trial court committed reversible error by granting the State’s motion in limine and excluding all evidence “as to the inherent dangerousness of the intersection prior to the accident and the subsequent improvements to correct these problems.” Without explanation, the Court of Appeals expressly addressed only that portion of this enumerated error and argument regarding whether it was error to exclude evidence of prior collisions at the same intersection; it concluded that the question of whether Dunagan drove through the intersection with the reckless disregard necessary to prove both reckless driving and serious injury by vehicle had nothing to do with the history of prior collisions at the intersection, and that given that there was no evidence of a signal malfunction at the intersection, the trial court did not abuse its discretion when it excluded evidence concerning prior incidents there as irrelevant to the question of Dunagan’s reckless disregard.2 Id. at 670 2.
