Domurat v. Oregon-Washington R. & N. Co.

134 P. 313, 66 Or. 135, 1913 Ore. LEXIS 372
CourtOregon Supreme Court
DecidedJuly 22, 1913
StatusPublished
Cited by12 cases

This text of 134 P. 313 (Domurat v. Oregon-Washington R. & N. Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Oregon Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Domurat v. Oregon-Washington R. & N. Co., 134 P. 313, 66 Or. 135, 1913 Ore. LEXIS 372 (Or. 1913).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Ramsey

delivered the opinion of the court.

There are five assignments of error in this case.

1. The plaintiff was permitted to amend the complaint by adding two paragraphs thereto after the commencement of the trial. These amendments did not substantially change the cause of action. Therefore the court had the right in its discretion to allow them: Section 102 L. O. L.; Doyle v. Southern Pac. Co., 56 Or. 495 (108 Pac. 201).

2. The defendant assigns as error the refusal of the court below to give the jury the requested charges numbered from two to ten, both inclusive. These requested charges were not discussed in the argument, and we presume that the defendant intended to waive ■any consideration of them by this court. However, we have examined them in connection with the instructions given, and we find that the substance of them was given in the instructions that were prepared and given [138]*138by the court. The instructions of the court are lengthy and fair, and covered every point in issue.

3. A trial court has the right to instruct the jury in its own language, and it is not error to refuse to give requested charges that state the law correctly, when the substance of the requested charges have been incorporated into the instructions prepared and given by the court: McGregor v. Oregon R. & N. Co., 50 Or. 527 (93 Pac. 465, 14 L. R. A. (N. S.) 668); Roth v. Northern Pac. Lumbering Co., 18 Or. 205 (22 Pac. 842); Galvin v. Brown & McCabe, 53 Or. 598 (101 Pac. 671); La Grande Nat. Bank v. Blum, 27 Or. 215 (41 Pac. 659); Nutt v. Isensee, 60 Or. 395 (119 Pac. 722). There was no error in refusing to give the requested charges.

The main points relied upon by the defendant in the argument are based upon the refusal of the court to grant a nonsuit, and the refusal of the court to instruct the jury to return a verdict for the defendant on the alleged ground that there was not sufficient evidence to be submitted to the jury, etc. These points raise substantially the same question.

4. If,.when the plaintiff’s evidence in chief was in, there was not sufficient evidence to be submitted to the jury, the defendant’s motion for a nonsuit should have been allowed.

5. If, when all the evidence in the case was in, there was not sufficient evidence to be submitted to the jury, the defendant’s motion for an instructed verdict should have been allowed.

6. Section 183, L. O. L., provides as follows: “A cause not sufficient to be submitted to the jury is one where it appears that, if the jury were to find a verdict for the plaintiff upon any or all of the issues t'o be tried, the court ought, if required, to set it aside for want of evidence to support it.” Article VII, Section 3 of the Constitution, as amended (see Laws 1911, [139]*139p. 7), provides under what conditions a verdict may he set aside for want of sufficient evidence to support it as follows: “In actions at law, where the value in controversy shall exceed $20.00, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of this state, unless the court can affirmatively say there is no evidence to support the verdict.” A verdict to be protected by this provision of the Constitution must be one rendered in a court having jurisdiction of the parties and the subject matter in a trial where there were no reversible errors of law committed by the court. A verdict thus rendered cannot be set aside by any court unless such court can say affirmatively»that there was no evidence to support it.

7. Construing Section 183, L. O. L., and Article YU, Section 3, of the Constitution together, we find that a motion for a judgment of nonsuit or an instructed verdict for the defendant should be allowed only when the court can say affirmatively that there is no evidence to support a verdict for the plaintiff. By the term “evidence, ’ ’ used in this connection, is meant legal evidence tending to support the plaintiff’s case.

8. The question, then, for decision is, Was there any evidence in the court below to support "a verdict for the plaintiff?

The evidence showed that the plaintiff was working for the defendant at the defendant’s freight depot in Portland on July 1, 1911, unloading freight from cars, and that he had been working for the defendant in that capacity nearly two years; that he had worked for other railroads in the middle west at the same sort of work about six years; that he understood that sort of work; and that he was accustomed to handling heavy freight.

[140]*140On July 1,1911, a safe arrived from Seattle en route to Boise, Idaho, and it was necessary to take it out of a freight-car and transfer it about 200 feet and put it into another car. It was boxed, so that it could not be readily determined that the box contained a safe. The plaintiff and his witnesses testified that the safe weighed about 1,800 pounds, and the defendant’s witnesses estimated that it weighed about 1,100 pounds. One of the defendant’s witnesses says the safe was round, like a ball, and that it was top-heavy. This witness, who acted as foreman in handling freight, said that about one safe a day was received by the defendant, and that he never saw a safe boxed, excepting safes -of the same kind as the one in question, and that safes usually came unboxed so that it could be seen that they were safes. The plaintiff testified that this was the only safe that he ever saw that was boxed.

■ On July 1, 1911, the foreman of those handling freight decided to unload this safe, and transfer it to another car about 200 feet distant. The foreman had five or six men in the car to move this safe, and called to the plaintiff to go and assist in moving it. They used a hand-truck in their efforts to move the box containing the safe. The foreman admitted that he decided that it was best to use a hand-truck for that purpose. The plaintiff testified that there were four men behind the truck and three at the handles, and that he had hold of one handle of the truck. He says, also, that the men behind the box containing the safe tipped it over on to the truck, and that the truck with the box on it was so heavy that he could not hold it, and that it pressed him down, and the truck fell on his foot and mashed two toes and cut off one of them. The toe cut off was the big toe of his left foot. He testified that the loss of this toe made him lame.

[141]*141The evidence shows that his toe was cut oft substantially as he claims. The plaintiff testified that he did not know or believe at the time that there was a safe in said box, or that it was heavy. He says that he was not informed by anyone that the box contained a safe, or that it was heavy, or that there was any danger in handling it. He did not see the waybill.

The amended complaint alleges that, when the box containing the said safe was tipped over upon the hand-truck, which the plaintiff and two other men were holding, the weight thereof was too great for them to hold.

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Bluebook (online)
134 P. 313, 66 Or. 135, 1913 Ore. LEXIS 372, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/domurat-v-oregon-washington-r-n-co-or-1913.