Midland Valley Railroad Co. v. Price

1927 OK 349, 260 P. 26, 127 Okla. 106, 1927 Okla. LEXIS 282
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedOctober 11, 1927
Docket17687
StatusPublished
Cited by11 cases

This text of 1927 OK 349 (Midland Valley Railroad Co. v. Price) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Midland Valley Railroad Co. v. Price, 1927 OK 349, 260 P. 26, 127 Okla. 106, 1927 Okla. LEXIS 282 (Okla. 1927).

Opinion

JEFFREY, O.

The parties to this appeal occupied the reverse order in the trial court, and will be here referred to as they appeared there This was an action by plaintiff against the Chicago, Rock Island & Gulf Railway Company, Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railway Company, St. Louis & San Francisco Railway Company, and the Midland Valley Railroad Company, in the district court of Jefferson county, Okla., for damages done to a shipment of steers. The items of damages are claimed in four separate causes of actions, and are: First, for shrinkage on 507 head at 50c per' head, caused by negligent delay in transit; second, for the death of 22 head at $79 per head; third, for bruises, scars, scratches, and other injuries to 485 head at $2 per head; and fourth, $40 expended' in the burial and disposition of the dead steers. Plaintiff loaded the steers at Jaeksboro, Tex., in the afternoon of April 22, 1924, and consigned the same to himself at Avant, Okla. The Chicago, Rock Island & Gulf Railway Company was the initial carrier; the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific, and the St. Louis & San Francisco Railway Company were connecting carriers, and the Midland Valley Railroad Company was the terminal or destination carrier. The shipment consisted of 507 head of four and five year old Stocker steers loaded in 17 cars. The shipment was made pursuant to the usual live stock contract, which provided, among other things, that the carrier in possession of said steers should not be liable for any loss or damage thereto by reason of the inherent vice, weakness, natural propensity of the animals, or the acts or default of the shipper. Said' contract further provided that no carrier should be liable on account of any injury or death Sustained by said live stock occasioned by overloading, crowding one upon another, escaping from cars, kicking or goring, or otherwise injuring themselves or e'ach other. Said contract further provided that the shipper, at his own risk and expense, should load and unload the live 'Stock, except where it became obligatory upon the carrier by reason of statute, or such duty is assumed by lawful tariff provision; that the carrier would not be bound to deliver said live stock in time for any particular market, or otherwise than with reasonable dispatch. At the instance of plaintiff, one W. J. Woods accompanied said shipment of steers as caretaker from the point of shipment to Avant, Okla.

Demurrer on behalf of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railway Company and the St. Louis & San Francisco Railway Company to plaintiff’s petition were sustained, and the cause was then dismissed as to each of these defendants. The case was tried to a jury and verdict was rendered in favor of plaintiff and against the defendant Midland Valley Railway Company, for the sum of $2,792.50. with interest at the rate of 6 per cent, from April 23, 1924. Judgment was duly rendered on said verdict, and the defendant appealed from the judgment upon numerous assignments of error, which are discussed in the brief under 15 propositions, or groups of specifications.

Defendant first complains that the court erred in overruling its demurrer to plaintiff’s first amended petition. This error, if such, is not assigned as error in the petition in error, and will not be considered. The Supreme Court will not review an alleged error unless the error complained of is assigned by the petition in error. Southwestern Cotton Seed Oil Co. v. Bank of Stroud, 12 Okla. 168, 79 Pac. 205; Lookabaugh v. Epperson, 28 Okla. 472, 114 Pac. 738.

It is next urged that the court, erred in overruling the demurrer to the evidence, and refusing to instruct the jury to return a verdict for defendant. No separate demurrer was interposed to the evidence offered in support of each separate cause of *108 action, but the court, at the close of all the evidence, was requested, by separate written instructions, to instruct the jury to return a verdict in favor of the defendant Midland Valley Railroad Company, on each separate cause of action set forth in said petition.

The first cause of action was for damage to the shipment of steers by reason of shrinkage occasioned by the negligent delay in the shipment. The petition complained of no damage prior to the delivery of the shipment to the defendant company at or unar Tulsa but, on the contrary, alleged that there was no delay up to that point. By plaintiff’s proof he undertook to show that such delays, as occurred, were after delivery to the destination carrier. The evidence in support of the first cause of action is substantially as follows: That the steers were loaded in Jacksboro. Tex., in the afternoon of April 22, 1924, and consigned by plaintiff t.o himself at Avant, Okla.; that he placed in charge of said shipment, W. J. Woods, who accompanied the steers to their destination; that he authorized Henry Va-den by telegrams to receive said cattle upon their arrival pursuant to a former arrangement, whereby Vaden had contracted to graze said cattle during the summer months. The evidence shows that the shipment arrived by way of the St. Louis & San Francisco Railway Company at Tulsa, about 2 p. m. April 23rd; that Woods, the attendant, left the train for the purpose of getting his lunch, and that the train moved out and left him in Tulsa : that upon inquiry he was told by a brakeman that the stock train had gone to Lefeber, the connecting point, where the shipment of steers would be delivered' to defendant. Woods arrived at Lefeber, according to his estimate of the time, at 4 o’clock p. m. and testified that he was told that the tracks upon which the stock cars were setting were the defendant company’s tracks. He further testified that the train remained there until almost night when it pulled out for Avant; that it passed through Avant about 8:30. and set the Price steers out at Nichol’s Switch several miles beyond Avant; that another train came and picked up the shipment, and returned the same to the stock yards at Mile Post 181, where the steers were to be unloaded at about 11 p. m. There was no siding at Mile Post 181, and the steers were unloaded from the main track, which required three hours and 20 minutes. With reference to the measure of damage by reason of shrinkage, the evidence is very unsatisfactory and uncertain. The evidence is that the steers were worth about $70 per head at the time of shipment, and that they- would average about 950 pounds apiece, and that a delay of 11 or 12 hours would amount to a considerable loss, but a delay of two hours would not amount to much damage. This was the testimony of plaintiff. Mr. Johnson said that he would guess that the steers would lose in weight 75 to 100 pounds per head. It is apparent that he was guessing at the loss upon the entire trip. When he was asked to estimate the shrinkage from the time that the steers were received by the defendant, he answered that he did not know what the shrinkage. would be. Under this state of the record, we are of the opinion that there was no competent evidence upon which the question of shrinkage should have been submitted to the jury, and no competent evidence upon which the jury could intelligently arrive at a verdict in favor of plaintiff on this item of damage, but that the verdict as to this cause of action was based solely on conjecture. As was said in Berry v. Chester et al., 23 Okla. 340, 100 Pac. 519, where a party claims compensation for an injury sustained, he must show, not only that he has suffered loss on account of such injury, but also the amount of it.

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Bluebook (online)
1927 OK 349, 260 P. 26, 127 Okla. 106, 1927 Okla. LEXIS 282, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/midland-valley-railroad-co-v-price-okla-1927.