Prothero v. Citizens' Street Railway Co.

33 N.E. 765, 134 Ind. 431, 1893 Ind. LEXIS 136
CourtIndiana Supreme Court
DecidedMarch 10, 1893
DocketNo. 15,580
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 33 N.E. 765 (Prothero v. Citizens' Street Railway Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Prothero v. Citizens' Street Railway Co., 33 N.E. 765, 134 Ind. 431, 1893 Ind. LEXIS 136 (Ind. 1893).

Opinion

Olds, J.

This is an action by the appellant against the appellee to recover damages resulting from an injury to the appellant alleged to have been inflicted by reason of the negligence of the appellee and its servants, through no negligence of the appellant. The appellant, at the time of the injury, was a passenger on appellee’s street railroad, and, leaving one car, stepped into the transfer car of appellee for the purpose of taking another car on appellee’s line; thatj while in the transfer car, the servant of the appellee suddenly opened the door [433]*433of the transfer car, which was done by means of a lever operated on the opposite side of the car, pushing the door into a perpendicular groove in the side of the car; that the method of opening the door was not perceptible by a person at such door; that appellant was unacquainted with the premises, the car was filled with passengers, and appellant was standing in the car near to or against the door, and when the door was so suddenly opened the appellant, without fault on her part, fell out of said door and was injured.

It is further alleged that she was occupying the position she did in the car at and before she fell by the direction of an employe of the appellee.

Issues were joined on the complaint, and there was a trial resulting in a verdict and judgment for appellee. Appellant filed a motion for a new trial, which was overruled, and exception reserved. This ruling is assigned as error.

The only questions discussed relate to the instructions given and refused by the court.

It is first contended that the court erred in the giving of the fifth instruction.

It is contended that this instruction is erroneous, for the reason that it attempts to enumerate the material facts as shown by the evidence, which should be considered by the jury in reaching their yerdict, and determining as to whether or not the appellee was guilty of negligence; that the court having attempted to enumerate the facts, it must enumerate all of the facts which there was evidence tending to establish, and relied upon by the appellant for a recovery, and that the court, in this instruction, omitted some of the facts relied upon, and which there was evidence tending to support.

If the premise of counsel were correct, it is possible this [434]*434conclusion would follow, but this we need not determine. We do not deem it necessary to set out the instruction in full. It does not attempt to set out or enumerate the facts which the jury shall consider. It is true, it does enumerate some facts.

The court, in a former instruction, stated to the jury the degree of care to be exercised by the appellee as a common carrier of passengers, and instructed them that it was an undisputed fact that the appellant was a passenger at the time of the injury. In this instruction the court told the jury that, "You will bear in mind what has been said as to the high degree of care required of a common carrier of passengers. With this in mind, you will review and consider all the evidence before you in the cause, tending to show the actual conduct of the defendant’s servants and employes, the construction, dimensions,” etc., of the transfer car, continuing by enumerating many other facts, and concluding by saying: "And, in short, all the facts brought out in evidence, bearing upon the question of the conduct of the defendant and its servants in this matter, and from a view of all of the facts and circumstances, you will determine and say whether the defendant has been guilty of that want of care required by the law or hot.”

The instruction does not bear upon its face or warrant the construction that it was intended to confine the jury to the consideration of the facts and circumstances enumerated, or to exclude any facts or circumstances disclosed by the evidence from their consideration; but, on the contrary, the jury were told that they should consider all the facts and circumstances disclosed by the evidence.

An instruction which sought to limit the consideration of the jury to the facts and circumstances enumerated in it, and which omitted material facts disclosed by the evidence, would no doubt be erroneous; but, as we con[435]*435strue this instruction, it does not attempt to so curtail the facts and circumstances to be considered by the jury, but expressly directs them to consider all the facts and circumstances disclosed by the evidence.

Counsel for the appellant next contend that the sixth instruction given by the court was erroneous. The instruction, omitting a formal part, is as follows:

‘ ‘The plaintiff was bound to use reasonable care on her part to avoid injury to which defendant’s negligence, if any,may have exposed her. Reasonable care may be defined to be that degree of care which a prudent person would have exercised under the circumstances in which the plaintiff found herself at that time. By this test, was the plaintiff free from negligence herself? Might she, situated as she was, by the exercise of ordinary prudence, have avoided injury to herself notwithstanding the negligent conduct of the defendant? If so, she can not recover if she failed to exercise such care. In considering this question all the evidence bearing upon the points indicated in the foregoing instruction, as to-defendant’s negligence, is proper to be considered also. If, in the light of all of these circumstances in evidence, a reasonably prudent person, exercising her faculties of sight and hearing, would have seen or heard, and avoided the danger; or, if the danger was apparent and easily avoidable to a person exercising reasonable care, as before defined, the plaintiff can not recover, if she negligently failed to avoid it, and must suffer the consequences of her own carelessness.”

It is insisted that this instruction is erroneous, for the reason that in view of the- place appellant was at, and the circumstances surrounding her, she was not under obligation to anticipate danger, or required to use her faculties of sight and hearing, or required to use any care at all to avoid danger.

[436]*436With this view of counsel we can not concur. She was at .a place where there was at least some danger, and where she did, in the course of her stay, receive an injury. The degree of care and vigilance to be exercised by a person depends much on the surroundings and apparent danger. The place where the injury to the appellant is alleged to have occurred, is alleged in the complaint to be, and is conceded to be, a small room or car used for; and denominated, a transfer car, situate in a public street, some two feet above the surface of the street, entered from the street by steps, and used for a waiting room for passengers upon the appellee’s lines of street railroad in the city of Indianapolis, into which passengers go to wait for a car, and which they pass through in changing from cars running upon one street to those running upon another, which car has doors opening and closing to admit passengers coming in, and to permit others to go out. While it may be a reasonably safe place, yet the very purpose and use made of it, as well as the .surroundings, necessarily make it a place of some danger, and require some care, on the part of persons entering it, to avoid injury. One is not justifiable to go into a public place and close his eyes and ears to the natural and ordinary use of the premises and things surrounding them, and lean against a door liable to be opened at any moment and permit him to fall.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
33 N.E. 765, 134 Ind. 431, 1893 Ind. LEXIS 136, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/prothero-v-citizens-street-railway-co-ind-1893.