Louisville & Nashville Railroad v. Jones

50 Fla. 225
CourtSupreme Court of Florida
DecidedJune 15, 1905
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 50 Fla. 225 (Louisville & Nashville Railroad v. Jones) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Louisville & Nashville Railroad v. Jones, 50 Fla. 225 (Fla. 1905).

Opinion

Whitfield, J.

Edward Jones as administrator of Joseph Jones, deceased, brought suit in the Circuit Court for Escambia county against the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company, to recover damages for the death of the deceased who received fatal injuries while engaged as a brakeman in an accident on defendant’s train. To a judgment in favor of the plaintiff a writ of error was taken from this court and the judgment was reversed be[228]*228cause of errors in the charges given by the court below, and a new trial was ordered. See Louisville & Nashville R. R. Co. v. Jones, 45 Fla. 407, 34 South. Rep. 246, where the pleadings are fully given.

At the second trial there being evidence that the fat tl accident occurred in “a cut,” a witness was asked the question: “Do you know whether or not there was a road crossing the track anywhere near that cut?” The question was objected to “because said question was impertinent, irrelevant and inadmissible, and no sufficient predicate had been laid,” and an exception was taken by the defendant to the order of the court overruling the objection. The witness answered, “Yes, there was.” The witness was also asked: “Do you know whether or not the engineer blew the whistle of his locomotive before he entered the cut?” An objection to the question on the ground that it was irrelevant, immaterial and not justified by the evidence was overruled and an exception noted. The witness answered: “No he did not blow.” Errors are assigned on these questions.

This court on the former writ of error in this case said: “The rule established in this State in negligence cases is that it is not necessary for the declaration to set out the facts constituting the negligence, but an allegation of sufficient acts causing the injury, coupled with an averment that they were negligently and carelessly done, will he sufficient. And where the negligence is alleged in general terms, and not confined to any specific acts of negligence, any acts of negligence contributory to the injury may be shown in proof.” It was held that under the allegation in the second count of the declaration that “the train was so negligently run and operated at a fast and dangerous rate of speed, etc., the general allegation of negligent operation calls for further explanation tcmake the [229]*229negligence appear, and this further explanation can he supplied in the proofs.” Louisville & Nashville R. R. Co. v. Jones, 45 Fla. 407, 34 South. Rep. 246. The testimony sought was for the purpose of showing negligent operation and the objections to the questions were properly overruled.

A witness was asked: “Do you know how fast this train was going at the time this accident took place?” The answer was “it was going pretty fast, about forty miles an hour, I could not tell.” The defendant objected to the question upon the ground that the witness had not train, and after the question was answered as above the shown himself competent to testify as to the speed of the defendant moved to strike the answer. Exceptions were duly taken to the orders of the court in overruling the objection to the question and in refusing to strike the answer, and errors are assigned thereon.

The witness saw the train immediately before the accident, and prior thereto had seen trains run, therefore he ordinarily could have been asked as to its speed. The question as asked, however, did not call for an answer as to how fast the train was run, but only whether or not witness knew how fast the train was going at the time the accident took place. The answer makes no positive statement as to speed except that “it was going pretty fast.” The other part of the answer “about forty miles an hour, I could not tell,” makes no positive statement as to speed; and under the facts of this case cannot be said to have injured the defendant even if it did not appear that the witness was competent to testify on this point.

Error is assigned on the giving of the following charges: “If you believe that at the time of his death the deceased had a minor sister, without property means, whom he had [230]*230supported, and that her reasonable expectancy was that he would have continued such support, then she would have a right to sue for the support which she lost by reason of his death, and such right of hers would deprive this plaintiff, as administrator of Joseph Jones, of any right to sue.” “If on the other hand you should find from the evidence that the deceased had a minor sister without property means and that the deceased, Joseph Jones, had not supported her, or if he had supported her, that she had no reasonable expectancy that he would have continued such support, then she would not have a i*ight to sue and this plaintiff would have a right to bring this suit, as administrator of Joseph Jones.”

These charges were predicated upon testimony tending to prove the following facts: “That the plaintiff was the father of Joseph Jones, the deceased, for whose alleged negligent killing by defendant the suit was brought; that beside the said deceased, the plaintiff, at the time of the death of deceased, had a wife and a girl eleven years old; that the plaintiff was physically infirm and had been for twenty odd years and at intervals was incapable of doing any work, and at all times unfit for hard manual labor; that plaintiff was not able to give his said daughter all she needed, and in order to get deceased to help him raise the girl, plaintiff had given her to deceased, when she was just beginning to walk; that ever since'then the deceased had contributed regularly and substantially to the support of the child and his mother (plaintiff’s wife), and sometimes, when plaintiff was sick, deceased was the sole and only support of the plaintiff and his said family; that deceased earned between fifteen and forty dollars per month; that deceased besides contributing money to support the family each month usually bought the clothes [231]*231and shoes for the said girl and paid her schooling; that whenever deceased’s said sister wanted anything she would tell her mother, who would get them for deceased; that deceased was unmarried and lived in the same house with plaintiff’s family and had done so all his life.”

In the opinion on the former writ of error (Louisville & Nashville R. R. Co. v. Jones, 45 Fla. 407, 34 South. Rep. 246), this court held that the right of the minor sister to sue rests on her dependency in fact upon her brother for support, and upon a reasonable expentancy of a continuation of support formerly voluntarily contributed. That decision became the law of this case. Anderson v. Northrop, 44 Fla. 472, 33 South. Rep. 419. The charges complained of are in accordance with that decision. The testimony on which the charges were hypothecated does not state that the eleven year old sister was dependent on the deceased minor brother for support, but that he “contributed regularly and substantially to the support of the child and his mother (plaintiff’s wife) and sometimes, when plaintiff was sick, deceased was the sole and only support of the plaintiff and his said family,” etc. The deceased was a minor living with his father as a member of his family, and it was within the province of the jury under the pleadings to find from the testimony adduced whether the minor sister was or was not in fact dependent on the deceased minor brother for support, and also whether or not she had a reasonable expectancy of a continuation of support formerly voluntarily contributed by him; and consequently the charges cannot be said to be erroneous.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
50 Fla. 225, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/louisville-nashville-railroad-v-jones-fla-1905.