Garard v. Manufacturers' Coal & Coke Co.

105 S.W. 767, 207 Mo. 242, 1907 Mo. LEXIS 203
CourtSupreme Court of Missouri
DecidedNovember 27, 1907
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 105 S.W. 767 (Garard v. Manufacturers' Coal & Coke Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Garard v. Manufacturers' Coal & Coke Co., 105 S.W. 767, 207 Mo. 242, 1907 Mo. LEXIS 203 (Mo. 1907).

Opinion

GRAVES, J.

Action for personal injuries occurring about the 23rd day of September, 1903. Plaintiff is a coal miner and on that date had an experience in the business of about five years.. Defendant is a Missouri corporation engaged in mining coal. Some three days prior to the injury, plaintiff was employed by the defendant to mine coal in its mine in Adair county. From the evidence it appears that the main entries in this mine run north and south from the shaft. From this north main entry there had been driven at least two entries running towards the east. David Shaw was defendant’s mine foreman and put the defendant to work. At the same time he also employed and put to [248]*248work one Scrivens. These parties were placed to work on the second east entry off from the north entrance. From this second east entry rooms were being “turned” or driven and worked to the north. When plaintiff was employed and placed to work, there had been three or four of these rooms “turned” or driven north, and either a fourth or fifth started. Some of the witnesses say that there were three rooms being worked and some say four. They all agree that one Hamilton was working in the last opened room to the east and that the plaintiff was placed to work in the room being opened just east of Hamilton, and that Scrivens was working in the room being opened just east of the plaintiff. The petition is exceedingly lengthy and verbose, but the negligence charged therein is thus stated:

“Plaintiff further states that defendant, wholly unmindful of its duties, had carelessly and negligently failed to trim the roof of said entry in which plaintiff was working as aforesaid, so as to work out loose boulders and rock therein, and failed to remove such loose boulders and rock, and carelessly and negligently left unsupported the walls and roof of said entry where plaintiff was working and passing to and from his work, and the roof over and above said entry, tramway and car tracks, thereby leaving the same in a defective and unsafe condition,' and by reason thereof the same were not reasonably safe, and said entry, tramway, and car track were not reasonably safe for the passage of plaintiff, in going to and from his said place of work, and in tbe performance of his duties as aforesaid, and defendant carelessly and negligently failed to support the walls and roof of said entry with timber and props, or other suitable materials of sufficient quantity and strength, as to prevent the same from falling and caving in on the plaintiff while at work and while engaged in the [249]*249performance of Ms duties, and to prevent rock, coal, earth and boulders from falling upon him, and carelessly and negligently failed to adopt any means to render said walls and roof reasonably safe, but on the contrary, allowed said walls and roof to become and remain in a dangerous and defective condition, by reason of rock and boulders and earth and coal therein becoming loosened and remaining loosened and liable to fall; by reason of all which said careless and negligent acts and conduct of defendant, the defendant’s said mine and said entry and the walls and roof thereof, and said tramway and said car track, were not reasonably safe, but were dangerous and defective; and that said dangerous and defective condition of said mine and said entry and the walls and roof thereof, and of said tramway and car track, as hereinbefore set forth, was then and there known by defendant, or could have been known by the defendant, by the exercise of ordinary care and prudence on its.part, in time to have fixed and' repaired the same, so that the said walls and roof, and said entry, and said tramway and car track, would have been reasonably safe; and when plaintiff was engaged in the discharge and performance of his duties as the employee of defendant, under his aforesaid contract, and was in line of his duty and at a point at which it was the duty of defendant to keep and maintain said walls and roof, entry, tramway, and car track, and its said mine in a reasonably safe condition for the protection of plaintiff while coming and going to his said place of work, and while he was in the performance of his duties as aforesaid, and without fault or negligence on Ms part, the wall and roof of said entry, which was above and over said tramway and car track, suddenly and without warning to plaintiff gave way and fell and caved in, and a great rock and mass of earth and coal, constituting a part of said wall and roof, fell on . the plaintiff, strildng him on the body and legs, and brrnsed [250]*250and crushed the flesh of his right leg, foot and ankle, and broke and crushed the bones of his right leg, and bruised, broke and crushed the bones of .right ankle and foot.”

By paragraph one of its answer, the defendant admits its corporate capacity and denies each and every other allegation of the petition. The second paragraph is a plea of contributory negligence, thus stated: “And for further answer defendant says that whatever injury plaintiff sustained at the time and place stated in said petition, was occasioned by and resulted from his own fault and negligence directly contributing thereto in voluntarily placing himself or remaining in a position of danger after notice and warning thereof. ’ ’

Upon a trial, plaintiff was awarded a verdict by a jury in the sum of $5000', upon which judgment was, entered. After unsuccessful motion for new trial, defendant appeals.

Both .defendant and plaintiff file abstracts of the evidence. A comparison of the two with the record shows that the one filed by plaintiff was fully authorized owing to omissions and othe'r inaccuracies in the one prepared by defendant, appellant.

Points made by defendant, together with the evidence bearing thereon, will be noted and stated in the opinion.

I. Defendant’s first contention is that its instruction in the nature of a demurrer to the evidence should have been sustained, and this for two reasons: (1) because the rock which fell upon and injured the plaintiff was “in a new entry not yet taken over by the defendant,” and (2) because plaintiff was himself negligent “in unnecessarily lingering for several minutes under the overhanging rock in the roof of the entry, when he heard it ‘chipping,’ knew that its fall was imminent, was warned by one fellow-servant and himself warned-another, when he had ample time to get to a place of [251]*251safety, and had no business where he remained, was guilty of negligence which as a matter of law bars á recovery herein.”

To properly discuss this, a statement of the facts shown becomes necessary.

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Bluebook (online)
105 S.W. 767, 207 Mo. 242, 1907 Mo. LEXIS 203, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/garard-v-manufacturers-coal-coke-co-mo-1907.