Hicks v. Southern Pacific Co.

76 P. 625, 27 Utah 526, 1904 Utah LEXIS 45
CourtUtah Supreme Court
DecidedApril 23, 1904
DocketNo. 1505
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 76 P. 625 (Hicks v. Southern Pacific Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Utah Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Hicks v. Southern Pacific Co., 76 P. 625, 27 Utah 526, 1904 Utah LEXIS 45 (Utah 1904).

Opinion

BASKIN, C. J.

[528]*5281 [527]*527This is an action to recover for an injury alleged to bave been inflicted upon tbe plaintiff by tbe negligence of tbe defendant, in whose service [528]*528the plaintiff was at the time the injury was received. It appears, in substancé, from the evidence of.the plaintiff, to which no objections appear to have been made by the defendant, and which was pertinent to the issues in the case, that on the day of the injury the plaintiff and his fellow workmen, while engaged under the direction and control of the defendant’s section foreman, were ordered by said foreman to place on a hand car standing upon the track two rails, each of which being about 30 feet in length, and weighing about 600 pounds, and run the hand car northward on the railroad track leading from that station at Ogden. At the time the foreman give this order, and after the rails were placed upon the hand car, he took out his watch, and, having looked at it, said: “Push out, and take them rails to the station. It is nearly train time. ’ ’ What station the rails were to be taken to, the foreman did not mention. In obedience to the order of the foreman, said employees pushed the hand car along the main track of the railroad for a considerable distance, to the Chase crossing at which place there was a side track upon which the hand car could have been switched; and the employees supposing that the rails were to be put off there, stopped and repared to remove them; but the foreman, who was following them up, in an excited manner and swinging his- arms, shouted: “What in the hell are you stopping there for? Go on. Hurry up.” Thereupon the employees pushed ahead until they reached a point where there was another side track upon which the hand car could have been switched, and upon reaching- that place they again stopped for the purpose of removing the hand ear from the main track; but the foreman, who was still following them, in the same excited manner as before, ordered them to go on, notwithstanding, in the meantime, a passenger train, a considerable distance from the station at Ogden was in view, and approaching at the rapid rate of speed of about 40 miles an hour. In obedience to the foreman, after the employees had moved forward some distance, [529]*529they were ordered by him to stop, and he came running up, and, in an excited manner, said: “The passenger train from Ogden is close at hand. It was due, or about due, when we started, and when I looked at my watch. Get the rails off. ’ ’ After one the rails had been thrown off the car, and the other one had been lifted on one of the ear wheels, and the plaintiff and his coworkers had hold of it, the foreman yelled out: “Throw it off. There will be a wreck.” Whereupon the parties having hold of the opposite end from that which the plaintiff had hold of, before any signal was given, threw the rail off; and the plaintiff, not having released his hold on the rail at the same time that the others did, was thrown down and injured by the rail striking him in the thigh. The distance from which the hand car was started was from a half to three-fourths of a mile from the point where it was stopped by the order of the foreman. The track over which it was pushed, for a considerable distance, was on an up grade; and, in propelling it with the heavy rails thereon, and owing to the hurry, the employees walked rapidly, and were some part of the time on the trot, and, when they reached the point where the accident occurred, they were “pretty well given out and tirfed. ’ ’ The distance from the place of the accident to the station at Ogden is 5.8 miles. The track between these places is straight, and a train could be plainly seen most of the way; and, when the train itself was not in view, the smoke from the locomotive could clearly be seen, and it indicated the movement and direction in which the train moved. At the time that the rail which caused the injury to the plaintiff was thrown down, the train was about 1,500 feet away, and coming at a rate of speed of about 40 miles an hour, and was in close proximity at the time the hand car was removed from the track. The plaintiff, in answer to the following question: “What length of time elapsed, Mr. Hicks, from the time the hand car was off the track, so that the train would not strike it, and the time when [530]*530the engine passed where the hand car had been at the time of the accident?” — said: “Well, they had just got it off. They had just got the track clear when the shadow of the engine came over me, from where I was laying.” At the close of plaintiff’s evidence, a nonsuit was granted on the defendant’s motion. The granting of the nonsuit is assigned as error.

1 In support of appellant’s contention, his counsel has cited the case of Northern Pac. Ry. Co. v. Behling, 6 C. C. A. 681, 57 Fed. 1037. The facts involved, and the ruling of the court thereon, appear in the following syllabus: “A section foreman in charge of a hand car was informed by the crew that a train was approaching from behind, but he ordered the men to go on ‘pumping’ until he told them to stop. He delayed giving the order until the train was so close that the car could not be removed from the track in the accustomed deliberate and safe manner, and, in the haste and excitement of getting it out of the way, one of the crew stumbled and lost his hold, by which the car was precipitated upon another Of the crew. Held, in an action by the latter against the railroad company, that the question whether the injury was due to negligence of the foreman was for the jury, and the court properly refused to direct a verdict for defendant. Coyne v. Railway Co., 10 Sup. Ct. 382, 133 U. S. 370 [33 L. Ed. 651], distinguished.” In the opinion the court said: “The case of Coyne v. Railway Co., 133 U. S. 370, 10 Sup. Ct. 382 [33 L. Ed. 651], is relied upon by the plaintiff in error, but is not in point. In that case the court say that ‘the injury to the plaintiff was not caused by any negligence on the part of McCormick, ’ the foreman. In this case the jury found the foreman was guilty of negligence in not giving a timely order for the removal of the hand car from the track, and that the injury to the plaintiff resulted from that act of negligence. In the Coyne Case the court said: ‘It does not appear that the approaching freight train was so near as to render it unsafe for McCormick to start the construction train,’ [531]*531and it was therefore held that an order to hasten the loading of the car was not a negligent act; but in the case at bar the jury found that the foreman was guilty of negligence, not in giving, but in delaying to give, the order for the removal of the hand car from the track, until there was imminent danger that it would be run into by the train before it could be removed. The serious consequences of such a collision were barely averted by unusual and extraordinary exertion on the part of the crew. The jury have found that this dangerous situation was brought about by the negligence of the foreman, and that as a result of such negligence the plaintiff sustained the injury complained of.” The syllabus of the casé in 133 U. S. 370, 10 Sup. Ct. 382, 33 L. Ed. 651, distinguished in the foregoing case, is as follows: “The plaintiff was a laborer or construction hand, under a construction boss or foreman of the defendant.

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Bluebook (online)
76 P. 625, 27 Utah 526, 1904 Utah LEXIS 45, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hicks-v-southern-pacific-co-utah-1904.