Tulo v. O'Gara Coal Co.

183 Ill. App. 423, 1913 Ill. App. LEXIS 1599
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedJune 10, 1913
StatusPublished

This text of 183 Ill. App. 423 (Tulo v. O'Gara Coal Co.) 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
Tulo v. O'Gara Coal Co., 183 Ill. App. 423, 1913 Ill. App. LEXIS 1599 (Ill. Ct. App. 1913).

Opinion

Mr. Presiding Justice McBride

delivered the opinion of the court.

This appeal is prosecuted to reverse a judgment obtained by plaintiff in the court below for eleven hundred dollars.

Appellant was the owner of a coal mine in Saline County, Illinois, known as No. 8, and was operating the same at the time that the plaintiff was injured, which occurred in its mine on about the 20th day of December, 1909. On the south of the main shaft is an entry of the width, of about fourteen feet and it is through this entry that the coal is loaded onto the cages and the men enter the cages from the south side of the shaft for the purpose of being hoisted to the top. There are some switches in this entry extending off to the south, in addition to the main track over which coal is sometimes brought to the mine. On the south side of this shaft at the distance of from fifteen to thirty feet a line is drawn over the top of this entry and marked “dead line” and is designated as the point at which men must stop and wait as they come in from the workings of the mine to be hoisted out. There is some evidence tending to show that this dead line was fixed by the defendant and other evidence tends to show that it was used by custom. On the afternoon in question at about 4:20 o’clock the plaintiff came from his work, and as the evidence shows stopped just south of this dead line and remained there until after the whistle blew at 4:30. In the meantime a large number of men had gathered, probably one hundred or more, and were standing in line, four deep, waiting for the shaft to quit hoisting coal and to take them to the top. The plaintiff was one of the foremost men of the column. In the meantime and while the men were assembled at this place waiting for the whistle to blow, and, as some of them say, about the time the whistle did blow the mine manager, George Barrowman, passed by the men congregated at this point and went further south to where some coal was being brought in by an electric motor. One of the witnesses testifies that when the mine manager went out to where the cars of coal were brought in and they had started to put them on the south and drop in the side “as we always did,” that Barrowman said.: “Pull them down and put them on the east and sling them in from there;” other witnesses say that, “In dropping them in from the south we have just enough speed to get them in.” Other witnesses say that there were twelve or fourteen cars in the trip; that they backed them on the east and got them upon a hill and that Barrowman said to sling them in as they had to have the track to get some props in the mine, and that it was after the whistle had blown; that the cars were brought down and slung in and they went in pretty fast, at the rate of about twenty miles an hour. Sprags were used but they broke as fast as they were put into the wheels. Cars were at other times brought in in this way but it was during the time at which the men were at work in the mine and then the cars were “chained down.” There were some cars loaded with coal standing close to the mine and as this trip of cars came running in so rapidly some one shouted “look out” and the men, including the plaintiff, became frightened and scattered seeking places of safety. The plaintiff heard the cars coming down the track and, as he says, became frightened and started to run to the pump. The trip of cars bumped against the cars that were standing at the mine and knocked them off the track and as plaintiff ran he was caught between one of these cars and a prop and was injured.

The evidence tends to show that at the time the mine manager directed this trip of cars to be “slnng in” on the track that he knew the track had such a grade as to cause the cars to run rapidly towards the place where the men were assembled, unless they were in some manner restrained, and he at that time knew where the men were standing.

Omitting the formal parts, the declaration alleges that the defendant had directed the plaintiff and others of its employes to stand and remain in that part of the said passageway near to the bottom of said shaft after their day’s work was completed- while waiting to be hoisted out of the mine; that it had been the custom and practice for some time prior for. the employes in said mine to gather in said passageway and there wait to be hoisted out, which said custom was known to the defendant; that on said day while plaintiff was waiting in said passageway, near the bottom of the shaft, to be hoisted, and while in the exercise of due care and caution for his own safety he was then and there injured in the manner following; said defendant, while the plaintiff and a number of other employes in said mine on said day were then and there waiting in said passageway to be hoisted out of said mine, which fact was then and there known to the defendant, or could have been known by the defendant by the exercise of reasonable care on its part, negligently, carelessly and recklessly caused a trip of loaded cars to be hauled by said electric motor power to the said incline at a rapid rate of speed along the track in said passageway while said plaintiff and other employes were then and there waiting as aforesaid, and said cars then and there ran upon and against other cars that were then and there standing on said track at and near the point where the plaintiff was then and there standing and caused certain of said cars to be derailed and thrown from said track, which cars being, derailed then and there ran upon and against the plaintiff and injured him. The cause was tried before a jury and it was determined by such jury that the defendant was guilty of. the negligence charged in the declaration; that the plaintiff was in the exercise of due care for his own safety and accordingly gave a verdict in favor of the plaintiff, upon which the court rendered judgment.

It is insisted by counsel for appellant that the court erred in its rulings upon the admissibility of evidence, the giving and refusing of instructions and the rendering of judgment herein, and we will consider the errors assigned and argued in the manner presented.

It is first insisted that there is such a variance between the declaration and the proof as to preclude a recovery; and one of the matters in which counsel claim there is a variance is that it is charged in the declaration that he was at the place before receiving his injury at the direction and order of the defendant and that the evidence shows he was there of his own volition. It does not seem to us that there is such variance here, if any, as to constitute reversible error, but if there was a variance the appellant is in no position to take advantage of it as it did not in any manner call the attention of the trial court to such variance. No motion of this character has been pointed out to us as having been made on the trial as to this or any other variance. “A motion to instruct the jury to find for the defendant on the ground of a variance between the pleadings and the evidence is not sufficient to raise the question of variance, unless the defendant, by its motion, indicates specifically in what the variance consists, so as to enable the court to pass upon it intelligently, and also to enable the plaintiff to so amend his declaration as to make it conform to the evidence.” Illinois Cent. R. Co. v. Behrens, 208 Ill. 20.

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Related

Illinois Central Railroad v. Behrens
69 N.E. 796 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1904)

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Bluebook (online)
183 Ill. App. 423, 1913 Ill. App. LEXIS 1599, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/tulo-v-ogara-coal-co-illappct-1913.