Fort Worth & Denver City Ry. Co. v. Rogers

62 S.W.2d 151, 1933 Tex. App. LEXIS 903
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJune 29, 1933
DocketNo 2843
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 62 S.W.2d 151 (Fort Worth & Denver City Ry. Co. v. Rogers) 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
Fort Worth & Denver City Ry. Co. v. Rogers, 62 S.W.2d 151, 1933 Tex. App. LEXIS 903 (Tex. Ct. App. 1933).

Opinion

HIGGINS, Justice.

Mrs. Rogers brought this suit against appellant to recover damages for the alleged negligent killing of her son Iloilo Rogers. She recovered judgment in the sum of $3,500, from which the defendant appeals.

The deceased was a member of appellant’s bridge gang. He was an experienced man in that line of work having been so engaged for many years.

At the time he received the injury which caused his death the gang was engaged in unloading heavy stringers from a steel gondola, car. A. S. Edwards was the foreman of the gang and in charge of the work being done.

The car was thirty-six feet long. The stringers were between twenty-seven and thirty feet long. The deceased was five feet six or seven inches high. Plaintiff’s witness, Caviness, estimated that it was eight to ten feet from the ground to the top of the ear. Edwards at one time said the car was practically four feet to the bottom from the ground and then from the bottom to the top four feet eight inches, and at another time he said the car was “about nine feet from the ground to the top of the body— about nine feet four inches I suppose somewhere along there.”

- In getting the stringers out of the bed of the car down to the ground where they were being laid two bridge ties ten feet long and eight by eight inches in size were leaned up against the northeast side of the bed of the car, a short distance back from each of the corners on that side, the upper ends of the ties resting against the side about two feet below the upper edge, so that a stringer, when pushed off the top of the side of the bed, had a drop of about two feet before striking the skids, down which it would slide to the ground. After the load of stringers was reduced so that they were some distance below the top of the bed, the men in the [152]*152ear used short two by six-inch skids upon which to slide or roll the stringers up to the top of the bed, from where they were pushed off onto the ten-foot skids. In doing this work, the foreman, with five of the crew, were up in the bed of the car, the five of the crew rolling or pushing the stringers up out of the bed to the top edge of the side, from whence, when released, they would slide to the ground.

When a, stringer was pushed to the top of the side, it would be released upon Edwards’ order to “roll it.” Rogers was on the ground. When a stringer was shoved over the side of the car and slid down the skids to the ground, Rogers, using a canthook, would slide it back against the other stringers then on the ground and line it up. He had no other service to perform and to do the same he would have about two minutes; in other words, a stringer was shoved over the side of the car about every two minutes. When Rogers performed such service, he had nothing to do except to repair to a place of safety and await the coming of another stringer. The evidence shows that when he had performed the operation stated, he would always repair to the north end of the ear and remain there until another stringer was unloaded.

A stringer had been unloaded. Rogers slid it back and lined it up. He repaired to the north end of the car and was standing there. Another stringer was shoved over the top of the side of the car and, as it descended, it struck Rogers upon the side of the head inflicting the fatal injury. The south end of this stringer descended ahead of the north end. The evidence is not clear whether the south end struck the ground before the north end began to descend, but in any event the South end was very near the ground before the north end began to descend the skid. The south end when it struck the ground first necessarily caused the north end to descend in an arc to the north.

The facts stated above are undisputed.

Briefly stated plaintiff alleged negligence in the following particulars: (a) Failure to furnish a safe car; (b) failure to furnish an adequate crew; (c) failure to furnish adequate machinery; (d) failure of appellant’s foreman to keep a lookout for Rogers; (e) failure of appellant’s foreman to warn Rogers; (f) negligence of appellant’s foreman in ordering stringer released before ascertaining that Rogers was in a safe position; (g) negligence of the crew in failing to keep a lookout for Rogers; (h) negligence of the crew in recklessly releasing the stringer without ascertaining that Rogers was in a place of safety.

The court submitted the following:

“Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that A. S. Edwards was entrusted by the defendant with the control and command of Rollo Rogers and the other members of the defendant’s bridge gang while said Rogers and the other members of said bridge gang were working for defendant?”
“Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that A. S. Edwards failed to keep a proper lookout to discover the presence of Rollo Rogers in a place of danger, .if you find that he was in a place of danger, at the time and immediately prior to the time Rollo Rogers was injured?”
“Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that A. S. Edwards failed to warn Rollo Rogers that a stringer was being released immediately prior to the time that Rol-lo Rogers was injured?
“Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant failed to provide a sufficient crew to perform the work of unloading and stacking the stringers in question at the time and place referred to in plaintiff’s original petition?”
“Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant failed to provide the bridge gang in question with adequate apparatus to assist in the unloading of the stringers at the time and place referred to in plaintiff’s original petition?”

The first issue was answered, “Yes.” The issues relating to a proper lookout and failure to warn were answered in plaintiff’s favor. It was also found that the same constituted negligence proximately causing the injury and death of Rogers.

The other two issues were answered, “No.”

The issue of unavoidable accident was also found in plaintiff’s favor.

It was found that on the occasion in question Rogers did not fail “to use that degree of care for his own safety that a reasonably prudent person would have used under the same or similar circumstances.”

No charge was made that the south end of the fatal stringer in going down the skids ahead of the north end was the result of negligence, nor was any such issue submitted or requested.

The foreman, Edwards, and the other five members of the crew in the car did not see the accident.

Plaintiff’s witnesses,' Oaviness and Anglin, saw the accident and testified as to the manner in which it occurred. They were the only witnesses who undertook to testify how it happened.

Oaviness operated a filling station about 100 yards distant. He testified that from the filling station he watched the men unloading the stringers; the men in the car would roll the stringers up the skids to the top or edge of the car and push them off and they would slide to the ground on the skids leaning against the side of the car. “I was looking [153]*153at the men doing this work at the particular time that Mr. Rogers was struck. Mr. Rogers was hit on the side of the head by the end of the stringer. It looked to me like it hit him right on the top of his'head.

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Bluebook (online)
62 S.W.2d 151, 1933 Tex. App. LEXIS 903, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/fort-worth-denver-city-ry-co-v-rogers-texapp-1933.