Streeter v. Humrichouse

261 Ill. App. 556, 1931 Ill. App. LEXIS 62
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedFebruary 17, 1931
DocketGen. No. 8,270
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 261 Ill. App. 556 (Streeter v. Humrichouse) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Streeter v. Humrichouse, 261 Ill. App. 556, 1931 Ill. App. LEXIS 62 (Ill. Ct. App. 1931).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Boggs

delivered the opinion of the court.

An action on the case was instituted by appellee against, appellant in the circuit court of Kankakee county to recover pecuniary damages alleged to have been sustained by reason of the death of appellee’s intestate in a collision between appellant’s automobile and a switch engine on which appellee’s intestate was riding.

State highway 17 runs in an easterly and westerly direction and, in the City of Kankakee, is known as Court Street. The. Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railway Company’s main track and a parallel switch track cross Court Street, run in a northwesterly and southeasterly direction. Burry J. MeG-ann, appellee’s intestate, was in the employ of said railroad as a switchman.

On September 23, 1927, appellee’s intestate, with Joe Tooper and N. L. DuFresne, two other switchmen, had been doing some switching south of Court Street, and were returning on the engine to the yards on the north side of said street. The engine in question was backing in a northwesterly direction, the tender or tank being to the front. McGrann and the two other switchmen were riding on the footboard on the tender. Appellant was riding in an automobile driven by her son, going in an easterly direction on Court Street. Said automobile and engine collided on the crossing, and appellee’s intestate received injuries from which he died.

The declaration as filed contained fifteen counts. At the close of appellee’s evidence the court directed a verdict on the first, third and fourth counts.

The second, seventh, eighth, tenth, twelfth,, fourteenth and fifteenth counts aver due care on the part of appellee’s intestate, and general negligence on the part of appellant. The fifth count charges that appellant negligently drove her automobile across the tracks of said railroad in excess of ten miles per hour, etc. The sixth, ninth and thirteenth counts charge wilful and wanton conduct in the operation of said car. The eleventh count charges that appellee, through her agent and servant, drove said automobile at a speed greater than was reasonable and proper, having regard to the traffic and use of the way.

To said declaration appellant filed a plea of the general issue: A trial was had, resulting in a verdict and judgment in favor of appellee for $10,000. To reverse said judgment, this appeal is prosecuted.

It is first insisted that the court erred in admitting in evidence certain photographs purporting to show said crossing, on the ground that the evidence failed to disclose that the conditions were the same at the time the photographs were taken as at the time of said collision.

There was a garage located on the south side of Court Street, the northeast corner of which was 71 feet from the center of the track on which said engine was running. The testimony of appellant’s witnesses is that automobiles were parked between the garage and said track at the time of the collision, which obstructed the view of the driver of appellant’s car as it approached said crossing. On the part of appellee the testimony was to the effect that there were no automobiles so parked at the time in question. The photographs disclosed certain automobiles, which it is conceded were not placed or stationed in the same relative position as the automobiles were at the time of said collision.

Counsel for appellee insist that such variation is not of sufficient importance to render the admission of said photographs erroneous, and also insist that even if there was error in said ruling, appellant not having abstracted said photographs, she is not in a position to raise this question.

Inasmuch as the testimony of appellee’s witnesses disclosed that the automobiles were not in the same position as on the day in question, appellant is in position to raise this question, even though the photographs are not abstracted. The court erred in, admitting said photographs. Chicago & Eastern Illinois R. Co. v. Crose, 214 Ill. 602-611; Lake Erie & Western R. Co. v. Wilson, 189 Ill. 89-96; Lips v. Chicago City Ry. Co., 209 Ill. App. 332-340; Althoff v. Illinois Cent. R. Co., 227 Ill. App. 417-419.

It is next insisted that the court erred in refusing to direct a verdict on the wilful and wanton counts, motions to that effect having been made at the close of appellee’s evidence and again at the close of all of the evidence. In this connection it is insisted that the evidence wholly fails to sustain said counts and, there being a general verdict, the judgment must be reversed.

Tooper testified on behalf of appellee that he was on the left side of the footboard on said engine; that “as we approached State route 17 I saw two machines that came from the s'outh or from the east. They stopped at the crossing, and there was this Dodge roadster that had come from the west that did not stop. . . . When I first noticed this Dodge roadster he was just about in front of that oil station, possibly 110 feet. We were right on the frog of the cross-over, around 60 feet from the crossing. ... In my opinion this Dodge roadster was traveling between -80 and 35 miles an hour when I first saw it. The engine was traveling about 15 miles an hour. When we were right at thé'edge of the pave-. ment the automobile was about 20 or 25 feet, as near as I could tell, away from the track. ... I jerked my body up with the ladder and the grab iron and raised my body and feet above the car as he went by. . . . The automobile knocked two inches of skin off my shin and knee. The automobile crossed the track before the engine crossed the pavement. I did not notice its speed. It was straddle of the black line when he went over the crossing, as though he was rumiing around the tank. The car went toward the north and turned back on the pavement to the east. He went about 50 or 60 feet over the crossing and then he stopped. The automobile struck Mr. McG-ann. He was standing on the south or east side of the footboard. The engine was traveling about 15 miles an hour as it crossed over the concrete pavement. . . . DuFresne climbed the draw-bar after I climbed the ladder. McGann was crushed about the hips and his limbs and blood was running down his shoe.”

DuFresne testified on behalf of appellee: “As we approached State route 17 I didn’t see any automobile standing, but I saw one coming from the west. We were about 60 feet from the concrete pavement at the time we first saw the car. The automobile was about 100 or 110 feet, something like that, at that time. . . . I should judge this automobile was running 30 or 35 miles per hour. The engine was just a few feet from the crossing. ... I didn’t think the autom'obile slowed up any, about the same speed, the way it looked. We were almost across as he went around us. He kind of headed northeast, north and then east. . . . After the automobile struck McGann it went on east about 100 to 110 feet and stopped.”

O’Reilly, the engineer on said engine, testified: “I watched this particular automobile. It slowed down. I saw the automobile coming up and it was getting slower. I just kept on going. Pretty soon the automobile picked up speed and shot around the end of the tank. At the time I saw the automobile begin to pick up speed the end of the tank was about 10 feet from the concrete pavement and the automobile was about 10 feet from the track on which we were traveling. . . .

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Bluebook (online)
261 Ill. App. 556, 1931 Ill. App. LEXIS 62, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/streeter-v-humrichouse-illappct-1931.