Railway Express Agency, Inc. v. Spain

Court of Appeals of Texas

Railway Express Agency, Inc. v. Spain

249 S.W.2d 644, 1952 Tex. App. LEXIS 2172

CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas

DecidedMay 7, 1952

Docket10037

StatusPublished

Cited by5 cases

This text of 249 S.W.2d 644 (Railway Express Agency, Inc. v. Spain) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

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Railway Express Agency, Inc. v. Spain, 249 S.W.2d 644, 1952 Tex. App. LEXIS 2172 (Tex. Ct. App. 1952).

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Opinion

HUGHES, Justice.

This is a suit for damages for personal injuries resulting in the death of Reuben F. Hunt.

Appellees, who were plaintiffs below, are the surviving widow of deceased, Ruth Faye Hunt Spain, her present husband, Floyd Spain, Billy Joe Hunt, J. C. Hunt, Larry Bill Hunt, minor children of deceased, and Mrs. Norvell Hunt, mother of deceased.

Defendants ‘below were appellant, Railway Express Agency, Inc., and R. F. Bacon.

After all parties had rested and prior to the submission of any issue to the jury before whom this case was tried, the trial judge granted the motion of R. F. Bacon for an instructed verdict, the jury, however, receiving no instructions to return a verdict for Mr. Bacon. Judgment was subsequently rendered that appellees take nothing as to R. F. Bacon and there is no appeal from this portion of the judgment.

Based upon the verdict of a jury judgment was rendered for appellees for a substantial sum from which judgment appellant prosecutes this appeal.

Mr. Hunt, at the time of his death, was an employee of appellant and was then engaged in driving one of its delivery trucks in the usual course of his employment.

Appellant was eligible to carry but did not carry Workmen’s Compensation Insurance as provided by our statutes.

Mr. Hunt’s death occurred at about 2:30 P.M. on February. 21, 1947, and immediately following the overturning of the truck he was driving which had just been hit by a half-ton pick-up truck driven by R. F. Bacon.

This collision occurred at or near the intersection of Rosedale Avenue and West 42nd Street in Austin, Texas.

The jury answered the following issue “Yes”:

“Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the Defendant, Railway Express Agency, Inc.’s furnishing to deceased, Reuben F. Hunt, on February 21, 1947, a truck with the left hand door so constructed that it was impossible for the driver thereof to give the required hand signals when such door was closed, was negligence as that term has been defined to you in this charge?”

It also found that this negligence was a proximate cause of the death of Mr. Hunt.

The first point made by appellant is that the evidence was insufficient to support the above finding of negligence.

*647 The truck being driven by Mr. Hunt was a standard one-ton Ford 1939 Model 60 chassis with a 9-inch rear extension to support a shelf extending back of the loading compartment. The body of this truck, however, was not a standard Ford body. It was a body manufactured by the Highland Body Manufacturing Company on specifications furnished by appellant.

The photograph of appellant’s truck, shown below, was taken by a police officer shortly after the collision and after the truck had been raised to an upright position.

The picture shows the door to be wide open. The door is suspended on rollers and operated by hand; it rolls or glides forward until the door space is entirely closed. The door, itself, is partly panel and partly fixed glass, there being no opening in the door through which the operator could put his arm or hand and give traffic *648 signals, nor was there any portion of the door which could he so opened.

*647

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