Battishill v. Humphreys

38 N.W. 581, 64 Mich. 514, 1888 Mich. LEXIS 969
CourtMichigan Supreme Court
DecidedJune 8, 1888
StatusPublished
Cited by45 cases

This text of 38 N.W. 581 (Battishill v. Humphreys) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Michigan Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Battishill v. Humphreys, 38 N.W. 581, 64 Mich. 514, 1888 Mich. LEXIS 969 (Mich. 1888).

Opinions

Champlin, J.

This is a suit for personal injuries to a little girl two years and seven months old. The child’s parents lived on Ferdinand avenue, in Detroit, a street which crossed the track of the Wabash, St. Louis & Pacific Railway Company at right angles at about 150 feet distant from the house.

The case was before us at the January term, 1887, (ante, 494), and we refer to the report of the case for a map showing the location of the place of the accident and the surroundings.

It appears from the testimony that plaintiff was injured on the afternoon of a July day in 1884. Her father was a street-car driver, and was absent from home at the time, attending to his daily avocation. His family consisted of his wife and two children, and his wife’s father, then about 80 years old. The younger child was then a baby. His wife attended the family, and did the marketing. Mrs. Battishill, the plaintiff’s mother, testified that, on the day of the accident, she went up to the city to buy groceries, and see her sister, who was sick; that she took the street car at half past 2, leaving the plaintiff at home in the care of her father, [516]*516who was 81 years old and in ordinary health. She left her younger child at home asleep. Her father was lying down when she left the house, but said he would get right up when she left the little girl with him. She did not take the plaintiff with her up town to get the groceries, because she could not carry her basket with the child. She knew the railroad was close by, but she never knew the child to go near it before. She had been in the habit of going away and buying groceries, and leaving the child.

She reached home between 4 and 5 o’clock, and found her child had been injured, and the doctors there. The child’s leg had been crushed between the foot and knee, and the surgeons amputated the limb between the knee and hip. In some manner not explained the child had gone upon the track of the railroad operated by defendants as receivers, ahd was injured at or near the point where Summit avenue crosses the railroad track.

George Lewis testifies to having witnessed the accident; and he says that plaintiff, when he first saw her, was on the track going across a culvert towards home. She was pretty near the middle of the culvert. He saw the train coming, and ran down, and tried to catch her off. She was walking across the culvert, with her feet on both sides of the rail. He tried to pull her off, but her stocking caught, so that he could not, and the train ran over her leg.

There is a clear view of the track west from Summit, avenue for two or three miles, and also from that point east to Clark avenue. The train of cars which did the injury was composed of an engine and tender, and four or five freight, cars. The engine and tender were running backwards, drawing after them the freight .cars. The train was properly manned with an engineer, fireman, conductor, and one brakeman. The engineer and fireman were at their proper stations, and the brakeman was upon the top of the car at the west, and the conductor on the top of the east car. The [517]*517train was going east. All of these who were sworn — and they were all sworn except the fireman, who was absent from the State — testified that they were keeping a proper lookout, and none of them saw the child upon the track, or were aware of the accident until after they-were informed of it upon their return to' Delray. The distance from Summit to Clark avenue is 320 feet.

John Levison was loading cinders on a car which stood on a side track five car-lengths west from Clark avenue. He saw the child on the track on the crossing at the culvert, and the train, at thé time, was at John O. street, which is 492 feet west from Summit avenue. It was coming towards him •at the rate of about three miles an hour. He looked away when the train got close to the child. He then, with Mr. Brandt and Mr. Bidgedale, went and picked up the child. They found her 10 or 12 feet from the cattle-guard at the crossing, inside, in the middle of the track between the rails. The train was going towards the city, and did not stop. They took the child to her father’s house. He testified that there is a straight track to the west to Delray, which is about two miles and a half, and there was no obstruction to the view.

Frederick Brandt testified that he was with Levison, loading cinders into the ear. He first saw the train at Junction avenue. This, by measurements testified to by Mr. Battishill, would be a distance of 738 feet west from Ferdinand .street. He says that he saw the child upon the track before she was run over. She was on Summit 'avenue, on the track; and he saw the train come up, and run over her. It was running faster than he could walk, — say five miles an hour. The train went on to the city without stopping. As soon as he saw that the child had been run over, he and his two companions ran to her, and found she had a leg off, and they picked her up and carried her home.

There was testimony introduced which tended to show that [518]*518those in charge of the engine failed and neglected to give the required and usual signals of alarm upon approaching the Summit-avenue crossing; and on the other side the testimony was positive that such signals of alarm were given. On this point the question was properly submitted to the jury.

Several of the errors assigned relate to the method pursued by the plaintiff’s counsel in conducting the trial.

It is improper for counsel engaged in a second trial of a cause to state, in the presence and hearing of the jury, what occurred upon the former trial; and where the Court can see that the remarks were likely to influence or prejudice the jury, the judgment will be reversed for that cause. It is competent, however, to interrogate a witness as to testimony given by him upon a former trial, for the purpose of refreshing his recollection, or of impeaching him. I do not think the first exception taken well grounded.

The fourth exception was taken to the remarks of counsel for plaintiff while addressing the jury, and the objectionable remarks stated by counsel for defendants were excluded by the court on exception being taken, as were also the remarks which were the subject of the sixth exception.

The seventh, eighth, ninth, and tenth exceptions purport to be based also upon the remarks of counsel in his argument to the jury. The record does not show the remarks made, or the connection in which they were made; but, in taking the exception, the counsel embodies certain expressions as having been made by the counsel for plaintiff. As some of these were disputed by counsel at the time, we cannot assume that he was correctly quoted in the exception. Others not disputed may be assumed to have been made. In some instances, when exceptions were taken, the court corrected counsel for plaintiff at the time; and,1 with respect to the eighth, he took occasion to correct him in his charge to the jury, as requested by counsel for defendants.

Upon the whole matter of the exceptions to the remarks [519]*519of counsel, while we do not approve, yet we cannot say that, they were likely to or did mislead or prejudice the jury against defendants. Extravagant expressions are apt to be used in the heat of argument. Invective is sometimes resorted to, persuasions made, and forensic skill employed,— all with the design to influence the jury in behalf of a client.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
38 N.W. 581, 64 Mich. 514, 1888 Mich. LEXIS 969, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/battishill-v-humphreys-mich-1888.