Homer v. Seaboard Air-Line Railway

86 S.E. 329, 17 Ga. App. 100, 1915 Ga. App. LEXIS 276
CourtCourt of Appeals of Georgia
DecidedSeptember 17, 1915
Docket6020
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 86 S.E. 329 (Homer v. Seaboard Air-Line Railway) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Homer v. Seaboard Air-Line Railway, 86 S.E. 329, 17 Ga. App. 100, 1915 Ga. App. LEXIS 276 (Ga. Ct. App. 1915).

Opinion

Wade, J.

Homer sued the Seaboard Air-Line Railway and the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Company for damages on account of personal injuries. On general demurrer of the Seaboard AirLine Railway, the court dismissed the action as to that company, and the plaintiff excepted. The petition alleged, that on October 13, 1913, the Seaboard Air-Line Railway delivered to the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Company a flat-car loaded with lumber; that “the Seaboard knew it would be used for hauling lumber ,by the Coast Line;” that these two railroad companies “had traffic arrangements with each other whereby the cars of one company would be transferred to the tracks of the other as the business-and traffic exigencies required;” that on October 16, 1913, the plaintiff, who was employed by the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Company as a switchman on the switch-engine crew, was switching several ears in the Coast Line yards, in the city of Savannah, including [101]*101the said car delivered to the Coast Line by the Seaboard Air-Line Kailway; that in the performance of his duties, he was standing by his car, giving a signal to the engineer in charge of the locomotive, when, by reason of the rottenness of the car-sills, the pockets intended for holding the uprights or standards used to confine lumber on the car pulled out, so that the lumber on the car fell down upon the plaintiff, injuring him in divers ways set out; that the injuries inflicted on him were the proximate result of the negligence of the two railroad companies in furnishing and using a car about which they knew he and other employees of the Coast Line had to work, and which was in so rotten and defective a condition that the pockets were likely to pull out and the contents to fall down and injure persons working about the car when loaded with lumber; and that by the exercise of ordinary care both defendants could have known of the condition of the car and of the likelihood that the pockets would pull out and permit the contents of the car to fall and injure persons about the same; that it was the duty of each defendant to inspect cars used for carrying lumber, and to have inspected this particular car; that a proper inspection would have disclosed the rotten condition of the sills and the consequent danger from its use; that the defendants were' negligent in failing to make such inspection, and used the car without such inspection as ordinary.care would have required; that the plaintiff himself was without fault; that it was not his duty to inspect the car, and he had no occasion or opportunity to know that the car-sills were defective or that there was any danger in operating the car, and could not by the exercise of ordinary care have discovered the condition of the sills.

It does not appear, from any allegations in the petition, that at the time the lumber fell on the plaintiff and inflicted the injuries for which he sued, the car was still loaded with the lumber which was on it when the car was delivered by the Seaboard Air-Line Kailway to the Coast Line three days before that time; and, under the rule that pleadings are to be construed most strongly against the pleader, it may be assumed that it was a different load of lumber. And if injury on account of the defective condition of the car resulted from a load placed on the car after the original load had been discharged, it should have been alleged that the car was delivered to the Coast Line with the express purpose that it be re[102]*102loaded with lumber by the Coast Line. Otherwise the Seaboard Air-Line Railway could not be charged with injuries resulting from defects in the car which the Coast Line should have discovered by inspection before reloading the car.

Our ruling in this case does not conflict with the ruling in Moon v. Northern Pacific R. Co., 46 Minn. 106 (48 N. W. 679, 21 Am. St. R. 194), that “Where, as between connecting lines of railway, the corporations controlling them are mutually bound to transport loaded freight-cars over their respective roads, such duty is necessarily subject to proper rules and regulations, and involves mutual obligations, among which is that of due diligence to provide safe cars for delivery to the servants of the company operating the connecting line to which they are transferred, and who would be exposed to danger from their defective or unsafe condition.” In that case it appears .that the plaintiff’s intestate, who was a brakeman in the employ of one railroad company, was killed while attempting to set a brake upon a loaded freight-car belonging to another railroad company, which car had been transferred by the company owning it to the track of the company by which the deceased was employed, for transportation over the road of the latter to a point thereon. There was a traffic arrangement between the companies, in pursuance of which loaded freight-cars were mutually transferred and transported over their respective lines, and, according to the rule adopted by the companies, cars so transported were inspected by both roads on the transfer track. The defective car, when received from the company owning it, was loaded with wood to be transported over the lines of the forwarding company, and, while it was being switched to its tracks by the forwarding company, the injury occurred, on account of a defective brake. The court held, that “the delivery of the car to the servants of the Manitoba Company [the said forwarding and connecting company] was an affirmation that the car was fit for use, and the latter were entitled to repose confidence in the implied assurance that such was the fact;” and that “the company owning the car should be held responsible for the consequences of its own wrongful or negligent acts or omissions, notwithstanding concurring negligent acts or omissions of the company receiving the car. The negligence of the latter does not excuse or relieve the former from liability for injuries resulting from its negligence.” Further in the same [103]*103case it was said: “Besides, in this case the inspection by the two companies was substantially one transaction, in pursuance of a mutual arrangement under which it was made jointly by the two car-inspectors.” And the court said that the case was different from Sawyer v. Railway Co., 39 Minn. 193 (35 N. W. 671, 8 Am. St. R. 648), in its facts, as “there the defective car did not come into the hands of the plaintiff by the consent or authority of the owner.” In Pennsylvania Railroad Co. v. Snyder, 55 Ohio St. 342 (45 N. E. 559, 60 Am. St. R. 700), it was held: “If a railroad company, having a traffic arrangement with a connecting line, transfers to it a car so defective as to be dangerous, to be hauled over the latter’s road, without having made a proper inspection thereof, and putting it in a sáfe condition for transportation, and an employee of the latter company is injured, during the course of his employment, because of a defect in the car, either company, or both, may be held answerable at the election of the injured party.

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Related

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196 S.E. 256 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1938)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
86 S.E. 329, 17 Ga. App. 100, 1915 Ga. App. LEXIS 276, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/homer-v-seaboard-air-line-railway-gactapp-1915.