Coleman v. Dallas Ry. & Terminal Co.

264 S.W.2d 753, 1954 Tex. App. LEXIS 1896
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJanuary 22, 1954
DocketNo. 14762
StatusPublished

This text of 264 S.W.2d 753 (Coleman v. Dallas Ry. & Terminal Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Coleman v. Dallas Ry. & Terminal Co., 264 S.W.2d 753, 1954 Tex. App. LEXIS 1896 (Tex. Ct. App. 1954).

Opinion

CRAMER, Justice.

Appellant Coleman filed this suit against appellee Street Railway Company to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by his wife Edith Coleman, as a passenger, when alighting from one of appel-lee’s busses. He alleged negligence of the bus driver.

After trial before a jury, the jury in a special issue verdict, found (1) appellant’s wife was injured; (2) that the bus driver did not close the bus door while Edith 'Coleman was attempting to pass through the door-; (5) bus driver did not operate said' door in such manner as to permit the door to close while Edith Coleman was attempting ti> pass through it; (8) the bus driver failed to keep a proper lookout for Edith [754]*754Coleman as she was attempting to pass through the door on said bus; (9) which was a proximate cause of her injuries; (10) Edith Coleman did not fail to keep a proper lookout; (12) the failure of Edith Coleman to remove her coat from the inside of the bus prior to the closing of the door was not negligence; (14) Edith Coleman did not permit the rear door of the bus to close on hér coat without making any effort to hold the door open; (17) Edith Coleman did not fail to hold the door open until she removed her hand from the rod inside the bus; (20) the failure of Edith Coleman to move away free and clear of the bus prior to the closing of the rear door was negligence, but (21) such negligence was not a proximate cause of her injuries; (22) that the accident was not an unavoidable accident; and (23) found appellant’s damage to be $3,250.

The frial court overruled appellant’s motion for judgment on the verdict and sustained appellee’s motion for judgment non obstante veredicto, which motion in substance asserted there was no evidence to sustain the jury’s findings to issues 8, 9, and 21.

From the judgment as entered and the overruling of his motion for new trial appellant has duly perfected this appeal, and here briefs four points of error in substance: Error (1) in overruling and not sustaining his motion for judgment-on the jury findings; (2) in sustaining the streetcar company’s motion for judgment n. o. v.; (3) in disregarding the jury’s answers to issues 8 and 9; and (4) in disregarding the jury’s finding to issue No. 21 that the failure of Edith Coleman to move away free and clear of the bus prior to the closing of the rear door was not a proximate cause of her injuries, and in holding such failure was, as a matter of law, a proximate cause of her injuries.

The effect of the verdict was (a) to con-, vict the streetcar company (issues 8 and 9) of one act of negligence proximately causing Edith Coleman’s injuries and to acquit it of all other acts asserted by the Cole-mans; (b) to acquit the Colemans of all negligence except Edith Coleman’s failure (issues 20 and 21) to move away free and clear of the bus prior to the closing of the door and that such act of negligence was not a proximate .cause of the injuries; (c) found the amount of damages at $3,250.

The trial court in entering the judgment n. o. v. held, as a matter of law, the jury’s findings to issues 8, 9, and 21 set out in substance above, were not sustained by any evidence of a probative nature; that there was no evidence to justify the submission of such issues to the jury.

This necessitates our reviewing the evidence most favorable to the Colemans to ascertain whether there was any evidence to sustain the jury’s answers to issues 8, 9, and 21, bearing in mind that Edith Coleman was a passenger while stepping from the bus and ceased to be such passenger only upon safety alighting from such bus at the intersection. Dallas Ry. & Terminal Co. v. Menefee, Tex.Civ.App., 190 S.W.2d 150 (ref. w. m.).

The evidence material to issues 8 and 9 is in substance that Edith Coleman and her husband B. L. Coleman on the occasion in question had boarded the Lemmon West Bus at the corner of Akard and Pacific Streets about 5:45 p. m. It was dusk dark and misting rain.

B. L. Coleman testified that when the bus reached Cedar Springs Street it turned off Haws onto Cedar Springs; he then pulled the cord for the next stop which was about the middle of the block. When the bus stopped he and Edith got up to go out the rear or back door; he had four or five medium-sized packages in his right arm; when he reached the door he pushed it open with his elbow and as he passed out he held the door (one side of the door, — the two sides open and shut together) open with his right elbow, and as he got' off he caught the other side with his left hand. Edith was right behind him; she came up against the door before he turned it loose and stepped away. At that time his wife was in the door holding the rod that runs up and down from the ceiling [755]*755to the floor with her right hand and pushing the door with her left side, she having bundles in her left arm at the time. The next thing that happened, he heard her scream, turned around and saw her caught in the door and the bus moving away. He screamed for the bus to stop and after it had moved about five or six feet it did stop. He knelt down and started to put his hands on her, when some one told him not to move her, not to bother her until the ambulance came. He further testified he was almost clear of the bus the last time he saw her.

A police officer arrived first, then the ambulance, and his wife was taken to Parkland Hospital. Before that, she lay there “kind of gasping to catch her breath. She wasn’t doing anything.” He went with her to Parkland Hospital. From the time he and his wife entered the streetcar until the accident, passengers on the bus were scattered, not crowded; at the time they left the bus it was less crowded than at any time before. He knew no one on the bus. At the time of the accident his wife had on a dress-length coat.

John L. Henderson, a passenger on the bus, testified in substance material here that he did not know the Colemans before the accident.' He was sitting in the seat across from the door and saw the Colemans when they started to get off the bus after it had stopped; Coleman got off first; then Edith. As she started out the door “ * * * the bus driver was racing the motor exceedingly for the bus to move properly, I mean, roughly, and as she started to get off and Coleman had already gotten off the bus, the door came back and caught her arm in the door and drug her about eight feet, eight or nine feet, just estimating, and I hollered myself to the bus driver to stop, which he was looking ahead and not paying any attention to the back of the bus, and for him to stop, because he had caught the lady in the bus. Well, at that time, he had gone at least eight or nine feet, I would say, and then he stopped, and we came back to the back of the bus. I went on out the back door myself, to where the lady was laying, and when I saw her, she was laying underneath the back wheel there, the wheel was just about to pass over her body, and he stopped, then, and then I run to my house and summoned the ambulance at that time. ,

“Q. Now, then, when she started out the door, did the bus move? A. Yes, sir, it moved when she. started out the door.
“Q. Did it move off easily or did it move rapidly? A. It moved off very roughly, it just taken off in a — the motor, he was mashing the accelerator at the time of the bus take off, you know, as soon as —I mean the bus moved while she was stepping out of the bus.
“Q.

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Related

Dallas Ry. & Terminal Co. v. Menefee
190 S.W.2d 150 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1945)

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Bluebook (online)
264 S.W.2d 753, 1954 Tex. App. LEXIS 1896, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/coleman-v-dallas-ry-terminal-co-texapp-1954.