Aetitus v. Spring Valley Coal Co.

Decision Date11 October 1910
Citation92 N.E. 579,246 Ill. 32
PartiesAETITUS v. SPRING VALLEY COAL CO.
CourtIllinois Supreme Court

OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE

Error to Appellate Court, Second District, on Appeal from Circuit Court, Bureau County; R. M. Skinner, Judge.

Action by Charles Aetitus against the Spring Valley Coal Company. Certiorari to review a judgment of the Appellate Court for the Second District affirming a judgment for plaintiff. Affirmed.

McDougall, Chapman & Bayne, for plaintiff in error.

J. L. Murphy and William Hawthorne, for defendant in error.

HAND, J.

This was an action on the case commenced in the circuit court of Bureau county by Charles Aetitus, the defendant in error, against the Spring Valley Coal Company, the plaintiff in error, to recover damages for a personal injury alleged to have been sustained by the defendant in error while in the employ of the plaintiff in error as a company man in its coal mine, in consequence of the willful violation by the plaintiff in error of sections 16 and 18 of the mines and mining act (Hurd's Rev. St. 1909, c. 93) in force on January 21, 1907, the date of the injury. The jury disagreed upon the first trial, and upon the second trial a verdict was rendered in favor of defendant in error for the sum of $2,000, upon which the court, after overruling motions for a new trial and in arrest of judgment, rendered judgment, which judgment, upon appeal, was affirmed by the Appellate Court for the Second District, and the record has been brought to this court by a writ of certiorari for further review.

The case was submitted to the jury upon a declaration consisting of two counts, and the general issue was pleaded. The first count was based upon section 18 of the mines and mining act, and charged a duty rested upon the plaintiff in error to employ a legally qualified mine examiner, and on each day to cause said mine examiner to visit and inspect the mine before the men were permitted to enter it, and to observe whether there were any unsafe conditions in the mine, and to mark conspicuously all places where dangerous conditions existed; and the second count was based upon section 16 of said act, and charged the duty of the plaintiff in error, through a duly qualified manager of said mine, to see that all dangerous places above and below were properly marked and danger signals displayed when required. Each count averred a willful disregard of the duty charged, in consequence of which the defendant in error was injured.

The evidence introduced on behalf of the defendant in error fairly tended to show that the plaintiff in error was engaged in constructing a mule stable in its mine; that, in order to prepare a location for the stable, it cleared out a space in an old entryway in the mine some 13 feet square, which entryway had nt one time been used as a lye or switch and later as a gobroom; that the space had been timbered about 20 years and was situated beneath about 400 feet of rock and earth; that the sides were perpendicular for 4 or 5 feet from the floor of the entryway and came together in the form of an arch at the top, the highest place, near the center, being from 12 to 13 feet from the floor of the entryway; that the accident occurred in the forenoon on Monday; that on the previous Friday, Saturday, and Sunday plaintiff in error had caused the gob timbers and the rock and débris which had fallen down to be removed from the said space; that on the morning of the injury the defendant in error and a workman by the name of Challenger, with the mine manager, met at the place where the stable was to be built, and the defendant in error and Challenger were directed by the mine manager to cut into the south rib of the cleared space two places, some five feet apart, from the floor to the height of eight or more feet, into which to place timbers as a support for the wall and roof of the stable; that the manager made chalk marks where the cuts for the upright timbers were to be made, and directed defendant in error to make one and Challenger the other; that thereafter the manager went away, and during the morning the assistant manager visited the place and gave the defendant in error and Challenger some directions as to the work; that the manager stated to the defendant in error and Challenger, before he left them, to be careful, as the rock might fall; that there were no marks or other signs notifying the defendant in error or Challenger the place was dangerous, neither of whom, so far as the evidence shows, had been at the place after the gob, débris, and timbers had been removed until they went to work to make the cuts in the rib; that the only lights in the place were from small lamps worn upon the caps of the men; that the defendant in error and Challenger pulled down some loose rock and tested the roof above them with their picks so far as they could and then commenced to make the cuts in the rib; that after they had worked about two hours, and after the defendant in error had made a cut in the rock of the rib from the floor of the entryway about 7 or 8 feet high and from 6 inches deep at the bottom to from 15 to 18 inches deep at the top, there was a fall of about 2 tons of rock from the roof immediately over where the defendant in error was standing, which struck him and knocked him down, rendering him unconscious and breaking his right arm and otherwise injuring him. The mine manager, the assistant mine manager,and the mine examiner of the plaintiff in error testified that they had each examined the space where the stable was to be built after the gob timbers and other débris had been removed; and that it was not a dangerous place in which to work at the time the defendant in error was set to work, and that no report had been made showing the place to be dangerous or any danger marks placed or notice for men to keep out for the reason that the place was not dangerous, and the mine manager testified the fall of rock was caused by reason of the work done by the defendant in error and Challenger in the place.

It is first contended that the court erred in refusing to take the case from the jury at the close of all the evidence. The question whether the rock and other débris which fell and struck defendant in error fell by reason of the condition of the roof before the defendant in error commenced work and that the place should have been marked as dangerous was a question of fact for the jury, and we think the evidence fairly tended to support the contention of defendant in error that the place was a dangerous place and should have been marked. The trial court, therefore, did not err in declining to take the case from the jury.

The attorney for defendant in error inquired of two of the jurors, on their voir dire, if they were interested in any casualty company which insured employers of labor against damages for injuries to employés. The court sustained an objection to that course of examination. Such examination, if made for the purpose of enabling counsel to exercise their right of peremptory challenge, was held in Iroquois Furnace Co. v. McCrea, 191 Ill. 340, 61 N. E. 79, to be proper. The trial court sustained an objection to the examination, and doubtless was of the opinion, from the character of the examination and the persons who were being interrogated, that the questions were not asked for the purpose of exercising the right of peremptory challenge of said jurors, but that the examination, under the authority of McCarthy v. Spring Valley Coal Co., 232 Ill. 473, 83 N. E. 957, was improper. As the amount of the verdict is not large considering defendant in error's injuries, and as the objection to the examination was promptly sustained by the trial court, we think, although the examination may have been for an improper purpose, its effect was not prejudicial, and that the judgment of the trial court should not be reversed by reason of such examination. In a case, however, where the verdict is large and it is not apparent the examination was for the purpose of exercising the right of peremptory challenge, under the authority of the McCarthy Case, we should not hesitate to reverse a judgment where the fact that the defendant, an employer of labor, was insured by a casualty company against damages for injuries to his employés had been improperly brought before the jurors during their voir dire.

It is also insisted by the plaintiff in error that the trial court committed reversible error in admitting in evidence the report of the accident made by plaintiff in error's general superintendent to...

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    • United States
    • Illinois Supreme Court
    • March 20, 1958
    ... ... Peebles v. O'Gara Coal Co., 239 Ill. 370, 88 N.E. 166.' We see no reason to depart from this ... same meaning that was given to the same word in the Mining Act, (Aetitus v. Spring Valley Coal Co., 246 Ill. 32, 38, 92 N.E. 579; Peebles v. O'Gara ... ...
  • Smithers v. Henriquez
    • United States
    • Illinois Supreme Court
    • June 15, 1938
    ...the jury were not actuated by passion or prejudice on that account, a verdict will not be disturbed. Aetitus v. Spring Valley Coal Co., 246 Ill. 32, 92 N.E. 579, 580,138 Am.St.Rep. 221. Aside from the general principles announced in those cases, they have no application here. This leaves fo......
  • Schultz v. Henry Ericsson Co.
    • United States
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    • October 7, 1914
    ... ... Piazzi v. Kerens-Donnewald Coal Co., 262 Ill. 30, 104 N. E. 200. This much is, in effect, conceded by ... It was held in Aetitus v. Spring Valley Coal Co., 246 Ill. 32 [92 N. E. 579,138 Am. St. Rep ... ...
  • Torcazo v. Statema
    • United States
    • U.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois
    • May 8, 1956
    ...Caffarello, 1940, 303 Ill.App. 574, 25 N.E.2d 534; Smithers v. Henriquez, 1938, 368 Ill. 588, 15 N.E.2d 499; Aetitus v. Spring Valley Coal Co., 1910, 246 Ill. 32, 36, 92 N.E. 579; Edwards v. Hill-Thomas Lime & Cement Co., 1941, 378 Ill. 180, 184, 37 N.E.2d In addition, it has been held that......
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