Akin v. Chicago & NW Ry. Co.
| Decision Date | 17 October 1927 |
| Docket Number | No. 7506.,7506. |
| Citation | 21 F.2d 1000 |
| Parties | AKIN v. CHICAGO & N. W. RY. CO. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit |
F. D. Larrabee, of Minneapolis, Minn. (Tautges & Wilder, of Minneapolis, Minn., on the brief), for plaintiff in error.
Leslie L. Brown, of Winona, Minn. (Stephen H. Somsen and Abbott W. Sawyer, both of Winona, Minn., on the brief), for defendant in error.
Before STONE and VAN VALKENBURGH, Circuit Judges, and POLLOCK, District Judge.
From a verdict directed against the plaintiff in a personal injury action, this writ of error is prosecuted.
This accident is alleged, in the amended petition, to have resulted from a fall caused by ice and a piece of wire upon the platform of one of defendant's passenger cars. The controlling question on this review is whether the evidence was sufficient to carry the case to the jury. If it was, the trial court erred in directing a verdict for defendant.
The view of the testimony most favorable to plaintiff may be summarized as follows: At about 9 o'clock on a bright, cold morning in January, plaintiff boarded one of defendant's trains at Waseca, Minnesota, to go to the next station, Janesville, which was about 12 miles distant. There had been a light snow the preceding night. Plaintiff went up the front steps on the north side of the day coach and crossed through the closed vestibule into the smoking car just ahead. He did this without hesitation and noticed nothing out of the ordinary. There was a "little snow" on the steps and platform. "I suppose it was sucked up in there." At Janesville, he retraced his steps to leave the train by the same steps he had used on entrance. Several other passengers preceded him in entire safety. Just as he was passing through the vestibule between the smoker and the day car and when he had reached the front edge of the day coach platform one of his feet slipped suddenly a few inches into a piece of wire lying there, resulting in an entanglement of his feet and his being heavily thrown with consequent injury. Until he slipped, he had noticed nothing out of the ordinary about the platform floor. When he slipped he looked down instinctively and saw what looked like slippery ice and snow where he had slipped. This slippery surface had been concealed by the light covering of snow which he had before noticed. Right after the accident, a passenger who was boarding the same train platform, saw ice on the floor of the vestibule where footsteps had...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Gegere v. Chicago & North Western Railway Co.
...those in charge of the train had knowledge of its existence and opportunity to remove the same, could not support a recovery. However in the Akin case the court made much of the fact that a coat of snow had drifted in covering the ice so as not to make it observable to the trainmen and that......
-
Ninni v. Pennsylvania Greyhound Lines
...Co., 1940, 290 Mich. 698, 288 N.W. 322, 291 N.W. 191; Bassell v. Hines, 6 Cir., 1929, 269 F. 231, 12 A.L.R. 1361; Akin v. Chicago & N. W. R. Co., 8 Cir., 1927, 21 F.2d 1000; Livingston v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., 4 Cir., 1928, 28 F.2d In an attempt to take this case outside the general r......
-
Rieschl v. Wis. Mich. Power Co.
...is the natural inference that the ice did not form instantaneously. It must have been there for some period of time. Akin v. Chicago & N. W. Ry. Co., 8 Cir., 21 F.2d 1000. The operator of the bus testified that from where he sat he was able to see the steps of the bus. The bus door was to h......
- In re Gallimore