Stimson v. Krueger

114 N.E. 885, 63 Ind. App. 567, 1917 Ind. App. LEXIS 13
CourtIndiana Court of Appeals
DecidedJanuary 25, 1917
DocketNo. 9,143
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 114 N.E. 885 (Stimson v. Krueger) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Stimson v. Krueger, 114 N.E. 885, 63 Ind. App. 567, 1917 Ind. App. LEXIS 13 (Ind. Ct. App. 1917).

Opinion

Hottel, J.

This is an appeal from a judgment in appellee’s favor, in an action brought by him to recover for personal injuries alleged to have been caused by appellant’s, negligence. The issues of fact were tendered by a complaint in one paragraph and a general denial. A demurrer to the complaint for want of facts, a motion for judgment on the answers to interrogatories and a motion for new trial, filed by appellant, were each overruled and exceptions properly saved. Each of said rulings is assigned as error in this court and relied on for reversal.

The grounds upon which the sufficiency of the complaint is [569]*569challenged, as set ont in the memorandum accompanying said demurrer, are, in substance, as follows: (1) It appears on the face of the complaint that the cause of action therein stated is predicated on the act of the legislature, approved March 2, 1911, commonly known as the “Employers’ Liability Act,” and such act has no application to the cause of action described in appellee’s complaint. §8020a et seq. Burns 1914, Acts 1911 *p. 145; (2) the complaint fails to show any duty owed by appellant to appellee which was neglected; (3) the complaint fails to show any order given by appellant to appellee that was negligently given; (4) the complaint shows on its face that the negligence, if any, responsible for the injury was the negligence of a fellow servant.

The averments of the complaint affecting said questions are in substance as follows: Appellant owns and operates a saw mill in Huntingburg, Dubois county, Indiana, and is engaged in the purchase and sale of timber, logs and lumber, and in such mill saws and cuts lumber of all kinds; that in the operation of his said mill and business, he employs more than five persons, to wit, fifty men; that logs purchased and delivered to appellant’s mill are brought in on wagons and trains and are unloaded in said mill yard by appellant’s employes in the following manner: They are rolled off of the wagons and freight cars on a skidway. A chain is then attached to said logs and a team, hitched to the other end of the chain, pulls and rolls said logs to the place and position desired, piling them one upon another, six or seven logs high. On October 9, 1912, appellee had been employed by appellant for about one year and, on said day, was directed by appellant’s foreman and vice principal, Harry Maley, to go into the yard and help one James Collins pile logs that were then being unloaded from. cars upon said skidway; and appellee “was directed by said foreman to put the chains around said logs, and when said chains were around said logs the said * * * Collins was directed to [570]*570drive up said team, and pile said logs upon one another with said team,” and while appellee was thus engaged in putting a chain around one of said logs upon said slcidway, which chain was attached to a double tree to which two horses of said defendant were hitched, said Collins carelessly and negligently started up said team. without any warning to appellee; that appellee was at said time standing in front of said logs and between said log and the pile of logs upon which said log was to be placed, and the team was on the other side of said pile; that said log to which the chain was being attached was about five feet from said pile of logs upon which it was to be placed, and when said team was so carelessly started by Collins and said log began to move appellee immediately “began to halloo to Collins to stop the team and at the same time attempted to escape by jumping and trying to climb over said log, but was in some way caught and rolled along with said log to said pile when one arm and leg were caught between said log and said pile of logs and broken and crushed, etc. That said injuries were ca/wsed wholly by the carelessness and negligence of appellant’s employe in starting up said team without any warning to appellee while he, appellee, was in said dangerous and precarious position; that when he received his injuries, appellee was in the line of his duty, obeying the orders and directions of appellant’s said foreman and vice principal, to whose orders and directions appellee was obliged to conform.

1. 2. [571]*5711. [570]*570If we correctly interpret appellant’s brief, the first three grounds of his objection to the complaint set out in his memorandum, indicated supra, are based upon a contention that the complaint shows upon its face that the orders and directions under which Collins started the team and caused the log in question to be moved by appellant, were orders and directions given by appellee himself. Of course, the statute under which the action was brought does not authorize recovery by the employe for injuries resulting from his own independent orders and [571]*571directions whether given negligently or otherwise, and if the complaint in fact shows that appellee gave the order and direction to Collins to start the team, and that snch order and direction was the proximate cause of his injury, the demurrer thereto should have been sustained. However, we do not so interpret such averments, nor do we think them fairly susceptible of such interpretation. While the language of the first part of the italicized averments, supra, is somewhat vague and uncertain as to who directed and gave the order to Collins to start the team, it clearly appears from the other averments, which follow, that, at the time of his injury, appellee did not give any order or signal to start the team, but that the team was started hy Collins without cmy warning to appellee, and at a time when he was still doing the work and carrying out the order of his superior, which placed him in a position of peril and danger if the log were moved before he had performed his work and gone to a place of safety.

3. 4. As to the fourth ground of objection, supra, it is sufficient to say that the fellow-servant rule is eliminated in cases brought within the provisions of the act of 1911, supra. Vandalia R. Co. v. Stillwell (1913), 181 Ind. 267, 104 N. E. 289, Ann. Cas. 1916D 258; Chicago, etc., R. Co. v. Mitchell (1915), 184 Ind. 383, 110 N. E. 680; Central Ind. R. Co. v. Clark (1916), 63 Ind. App. 49, 112 N. E. 892. For interpretation and construction of other provisions of said act, see S. W. Little Coal Co. v. O’Brien (1916), ante 504, 113 N. E. 465; Standard Steel Car Co. v. Martinecz (1916), — Ind. App. —, 113 N. E. 244: The averments of the complaint above indicated are, we think, clearly sufficient to bring the case within said statute, as construed and interpreted in said cases, and sufficient to meet all the objections of appellant above indicated.

No material or essential fact is found by the answers to interrogatories that is in irreconcilable conflict with the [572]*572general verdict. Indeed, such answers are in harmony with, and tend to support, rather than contradict, such verdict. It follows that no error resulted from the ruling on appellant’s motion for judgment on such answers. Lake Erie, etc., R. Co. v. McConkey (1916), 62 Ind. App. 447, 113 N. E. 24, and eases there cited.

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Bluebook (online)
114 N.E. 885, 63 Ind. App. 567, 1917 Ind. App. LEXIS 13, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/stimson-v-krueger-indctapp-1917.