Sumey v. Craig Mountain Lumber Co.

170 P. 112, 31 Idaho 234, 1918 Ida. LEXIS 24
CourtIdaho Supreme Court
DecidedJanuary 7, 1918
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 170 P. 112 (Sumey v. Craig Mountain Lumber Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Idaho Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Sumey v. Craig Mountain Lumber Co., 170 P. 112, 31 Idaho 234, 1918 Ida. LEXIS 24 (Idaho 1918).

Opinion

MORGAN, J.

Respondent, a citizen and resident of Idaho, instituted this action against appellant, a foreign corporation, to recover $2,995 damages for personal injuries received while working with a jammer, or derrick, used in hoisting logs. The action was brought under the provisions of the Employers’ Liability Law, Sess. Laws, 1909, p. 34, and the trial resulted in a judgment for respondent, for the amount claimed, which was reversed because the facts established did not bring the case within the scope of that act of the legislature. (Sumey v. Craig Mountain L. Co., 27 Ida. 721, 152 Pac. 181.) Thereafter the complaint was amended; J. J. Bair, a citizen and resident of Idaho, was joined with appellant, as a party defendant, and judgment in the sum of $25,000 was demanded. The second trial resulted in a nonsuit in favor of Bair, and in a judgment for $7,500 for respondent against appellant, from which, and from an order denying a motion for a new trial, this appeal has been taken.

Prior to filing its answer appellant petitioned for removal of the cause to the federal court, alleging that Bair had been made a party, fraudulently, for the purpose of retaining jurisdiction in the state court. Upon consideration of the record, composed of the complaint and petition, the trial court denied the removal and retained jurisdiction. When the motion for nonsuit was granted in favor of Bair the petition for removal was renewed by appellant and was again denied. This action of the court is assigned as error.

[238]*238It is alleged in the complaint, among other things, that at the time he received his injuries “plaintiff was working as an employee of and under the employment of the said defendants, and especially the defendant, Craig Mountain Lumber Company, Limited, and under the direction of the defendant, J. J. Bair.” Another allegation of the complaint is to the effect that respondent was employed to work as a cant-hook man on the ground and that he told the defendants he had never worked on top of a skidway, where he was subsequently required to work; that he was unaware that the place where he was required to work was dangerous; that defendants had knowledge of his inexperience in working on top of a skidway and with a jammer, but notwithstanding such knowledge they failed to inform him of the dangerous condition of the place and of the appliance with which he wa§ required to work, and negligently, wilfully, carelessly and wantonly placed him in an unnecessarily dangerous place and furnished him unnecessarily dangerous tools and machinery with the use of which he was unskilled and unacquainted.

It is alleged, among other things, in the petition for removal, that the action had originally been commenced by respondent against appellant, alone, and in his complaint he had alleged he was injured while working in the employ of appellant and no suggestion or claim was made that Bair was a joint employer; that on the former trial of the case respondent testified he was in the employ and worked under the direction of appellant; that Bair was a foreman, or superintendent, who had charge of the work on appellant’s behalf and it had never been claimed by respondent in his complaint, nor in his evidence previously given, that Bair was one of his employers.

•It is difficult to determine from the complaint, standing alone, whether it was respondent’s theory that Bair was jointly liable with appellant as an employer, or because of neglect and improper discharge of his duties, as appellant’s foreman, whereby respondent was injured. The allegation quoted from the petition rather strengthens than weakens [239]*239the complaint in this particular. For the purpose of deciding the question of jurisdiction it was unnecessary for the trial court to determine under which of these theories it was contended Bair’s liability arose. It is sufficient to say, from the allegations of the petition for removal and the uncontroverted facts alleged in the complaint, he appeared to be jointly liable with appellant, either as a coemployer or because of the improper discharge of, or failure to discharge, his duties as appellant’s ag'ent; that the facts alleged in the petition for removal had a tendency, if uncontradicted or unexplained at the trial, to impeach, or weaken, testimony respondent might give in support of his amended complaint but, admitted to be true, it does not defeat his right to attempt to maintain his action against Bair, and therefore jurisdiction of the case was properly retained in the state court regardless of what respondent’s motive may have been in making him a defendant. (Chesapeake & O. R. Co. v. Cockrell, 232 U. S. 146, 34 Sup. Ct. 278, 58 L. ed. 544; Russell v. Champion Fiber Co., 214 Fed. 963, 131 C. C. A. 259 ; 2 Foster’s Federal Practice, 5th ed., secs. 540, 1781-1787.)

It does not appear that the nonsuit was granted in favor of Bair with respondent’s consent, and there was no error in the action of the trial court in again denying the petition for removal at that point in the proceedings. “Where the plaintiff, in good faith, insists on the joint liability of all the defendants throughout the trial, and the complaint is dismissed upon the merits as to such as are citizens of his state, the remaining defendants cannot then remove tho case.” (2 Foster’s Federal Practice, 5th ed., 1821; Moeller v. Southern Pacific Co., 211 Fed. 239; Whitcomb v. Smithson, 175 U. S. 635, 20 Sup. Ct. 248, 44 L. ed. 303.) As was said by the court in the case last above cited: “The right to remove was not contingent on the aspect the case may have assumed on the facts developed on the merits of the issue tried.”

Appellant further insists the case should have been removed because it appeared Bair was f oreman upon the work and that his neglect to warn respondent of the danger, inhe[240]*240rent in his employment, was an act of nonfeasance rather than misfeasance or malfeasance, and that his liability, if any existed, was to his employer and not to respondent. ' The distinction sought to be made by many courts, in cases of this kind, between negligent failure to perform his duty, upon the part of an employee placed in a responsible position by his employer, and carelessness or wilful misconduct in its performance, appears to be more theoretical than substantial. In other words, had the trial judge submitted to the jury the question of Bair’s liability, that action would have been sustained, if based upon evidence showing his conduct, resulting in respondent’s injury, amounted to either malfeasance, misfeasance or nonfeasance. Very instructive notes upon this subject are to be found appended to the cases of Mayer v. Thompson-Hutchinson Building Co., 104 Ala. 611, 53 Am. St. 88, 16 So. 620, 28 L. R. A. 433, and Ward v. Pullman Co., 131 Ky. 142, 114 S. W. 754, 25 L. R. A., N. S., 343.

The evidence disclosed that respondent was employed by appellant, in the first instance, as a cant-hook man; that his duty was to work upon the ground and roll logs within reach of the jammer; that he was afterward directed to work on top of a pile of logs whereon other logs were being placed by means of the jammer, which was equipped with a main cable from which two other cables branched forming what is called a ‘ ‘ crotch, ’ ’ to the ends of which hooks were affixed.

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Bluebook (online)
170 P. 112, 31 Idaho 234, 1918 Ida. LEXIS 24, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/sumey-v-craig-mountain-lumber-co-idaho-1918.