Lewis v. Haynes

98 So. 2d 52, 266 Ala. 564, 1957 Ala. LEXIS 595
CourtSupreme Court of Alabama
DecidedNovember 7, 1957
Docket7 Div. 361
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 98 So. 2d 52 (Lewis v. Haynes) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Alabama primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Lewis v. Haynes, 98 So. 2d 52, 266 Ala. 564, 1957 Ala. LEXIS 595 (Ala. 1957).

Opinion

LAWSON, Justice.

From the complaint in this cause it appears that on or about January l5r 1956, Bill Lewis suffered injuries' to his person as a result of a fall which occurred while he was engaged in painting the interior of a store building wherein D. Frank Haynes operated a refrigeration service store.

Lewis filed suit against Haynes, claiming $25,000 damages for the injuries which he alleged he sustained as a result of the fall. The complaint as originally filed consisted of only one count. Haynes filed a demurrer but before any action was taken thereon Lewis amended his complaint by adding Count Two. Haynes reassigned the original demurrer, which contained nine grounds, and added grounds ten through eighteen. The demurrer was sustained. Lewis then amended his complaint by adding Counts Three and Four. Thereupon the trial court rendered another decree sustaining “the defendant’s demurrers to the Complaint as last amended.” We find in the record no demurrer assigned or reassigned to the complaint as thus amended. Lewis again amended his complaint. Pie added Counts Five and Six. Haynes reassigned “his demurrers as previously filed in this case to the complaint of the plaintiff, as last amended, and to counts one through six thereof, separately and severally.” Thereafter the trial court rendered a decree sustaining “defendant’s demurrers to Counts 5 and 6 of the complaint.”

Lewis, the plaintiff, then suffered a nonsuit and has appealed as authorized by the statute. § 819, Title 7, Code 1940. The judgment of nonsuit is in form a final judgment which will support an appeal. Cooper v. City of Fairhope, 263 Ala. 619, 83 So.2d 321; Gladden v. Columbiana Sav. Bank, 235 Ala. 541, 180 So. 548; Thomas v. White, 244 Ala. 128, 12 So.2d 567. Cf. Couch v. Rodgers, 257 Ala. 560, 59 So.2d 809; Biddle v. Employers Ins. Co. of Alabama, 257 Ala. 276, 58 So.2d 596; Heffelfinger v. Lane, 239 Ala. 151, 194 So. 504.

It appears from the motion of plaintiff for the nonsuit and the judgment thereon that the nonsuit was superinduced by the cumulative rulings of the court on the demurrer of the defendant, hence each’of the decrees may be assigned as error. City of Mobile v. Board of Revenue and Road Com’rs of Mobile County, 219 Ala. 60, 121 So. 49; Mixon v. Trawick, 264 Ala. 82, 84 So.2d 760; Russell v. Garrett, 208 Ala. 92, 93 So. 711; Garner v. Baker, 214 Ala. 385, 108 So. 38; MacMahon v. City of Mobile, 253 Ala. 436, 44 So.2d 570.

Appellant has made no assignment of error challenging the court’s action in sustaining the demurrer to Count One, so such action will not be passed on by this court. Calvert v. J. M. Steverson & Sons Lumber Co., 244 Ala. 206, 12 So.2d 365; Allen v. Birmingham Southern R. Co., 210 Ala. 41, 97 So. 93.

The first assignment of error attacks the decree sustaining the demurrer to Count Two. It is not argued in brief and will not be considered. Simpson v. Birmingham Electric Co., 261 Ala. 599, 75 So.2d 111.

The remaining assignments of error are argued in bulk in brief filed here on behalf of appellant. They are to the effect that the court erred in sustaining the defendant’s demurrer to Counts Three, Four, Five and Six of the complaint.

[567]*567We have not been favored in brief filed here on behalf of the appellant, the plaintiff below, with a discussion of the averments of any of the counts of the complaint or with a statement of the theory or theories upon which the plaintiff relies in his effort to fasten liability upon the appellee, the defendant below. We are not going to attempt to make any detailed analysis of any of the counts.

All of the counts contain the inconsistent averments to the effect that the plaintiff at the time of his injury was both a casual employee and an independent contractor. But the theory of liability is not the same in all of the counts, if we have construed them correctly. For instance, Count Three seems to declare solely upon a breach of an alleged duty on the part of Haynes to pro; vide plaintiff with a reasonably safe place to work. Apparently the plaintiff here relies upon a claimed common law duty. Count Four, on the other hand, as we have indicated, charged the defendant with willful or wanton negligence in supplying the plaintiff with a defective scaffold and also declares on the alleged willful or wanton negligence of the defendant in failing to provide plaintiff with a reasonably safe place within which to do his work. Counts Five and Six are also unlike Count Three and for that matter, we do not understand that any of the four counts here under consideration are sufficiently similar as to justify the assignments of error based upon the several rulings of the court. sustaining the demurrer to be argued in bulk. Moseley v. Alabama Power Co., 246 Ala. 416, 21 So.2d 305.

The count of the complaint should be framed upon a definite theory so as to inform the defendant of the issue he is called upon to meet and to furnish the court with a means of determining the relevancy of the evidence. A count cannot be made elastic so as to take form with the varying views of counsel or the developments of the evidence. It should be framed so as to show the breach of some particular duty, or the violation of some specific right, and on that theory must succeed or fall. McGhee v. Reynolds, 129 Ala. 540, 29 So. 961; J. T. Camp Transfer Co. v. Davenport, 15 Ala.App. 507, 74 So. 156, certiorari denied Ex parte Davenport, 199 Ala. 698, 74 So. 1005.

In Count Four the plaintiff says he was a casual employee of the defendant at the time of the injury and in the very next breath says that he was an independent contractor. But those inconsistent averments do not stand alone, as we have heretofore shown. If we understand that count correctly, it is subject to the construction that the plaintiff says that while he was a casual employee of the defendant he was injured as a result of the willful and wanton negligence of the defendant .in supplying him-.with a defective scaffold; that while he was a casual employee of defendant he was injured as a'result of the willful'or wanton negligence of the defendant in failing to furnish him a reasonably safe place in which to do his work; that while he was an independent contractor doing work for the defendant he was injured as a result of the.'willful or wanton negligence of the defendant in furnishing him a defective scaffold; and that while he was an independent contractor doing work for the defendant he was injured as the result of the willful or wanton negligence of the defendant in failing to furnish him a reasonably safe place in which to do his work.

We observe, at this point that this count perhaps only charges simple negligence. See Louisville & N. R. Co. v. Orr, 121 Ala. 489, 26 So. 35.

Count Four not only fails to disclose with certainty the relationship of the parties out of which plaintiff claims a duty arose from the defendant to the plaintiff (Drennen Motor Car Co. v. Webb, 226 Ala. 353, 147 So. 143; Levans v. Louisville & N. R. Co., 228 Ala. 643, 154 So. 784), but it does not in our opinion inform the defendant with reasonable certainty as to the particular liability sought to be enforced. The defendant, of course, has no right to dictate to the plaintiff under which subdivision of [568]

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Bluebook (online)
98 So. 2d 52, 266 Ala. 564, 1957 Ala. LEXIS 595, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/lewis-v-haynes-ala-1957.