Berry v. Stone
Decision Date | 22 April 1963 |
Citation | 189 N.E.2d 852,345 Mass. 752 |
Parties | Evelyn BERRY v. David B. STONE et al. |
Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Thomas D. Burns, Boston (Frank Shapiro, Boston, with him), for plaintiff.
Walter F. Henneberry, Boston (John J. C. Herlihy, Boston, with him), for defendants.
Before WILKINS, C. J., and SPALDING, WHITTEMORE, CUTTER and KIRK, JJ.
These are the defendants' exceptions in an action of tort to the denial of a motion for a directed verdict, based on the pleadings and the evidence, to rulings on evidence, and to the plaintiff's argument and the charge. The action was brought for injuries sustained by the plaintiff on April 23, 1958, in the house of the defendants where she was temporarily employed to take care of the defendants' new born baby and three older children.
The plaintiff testified, inter alia, as follows: Six year old David, on April 23, threw gravel on the playroom floor as he had done before; the plaintiff had cleaned it up on the previous occasions; this time she spoke of the resulting 'dangerous condition' to the defendant Sara C. Stone (hereinafter sometimes referred to as the defendant); the defendant said she would see that David cleaned up the gravel; about five minutes later the defendant came into the kitchen and said she was going out to visit; the plaintiff went upstairs with laundry and on the way saw the gravel; after putting the laundry away she heard the baby cry and she came down stairs hurriedly and was running across the playroom floor when her heel struck the pebbles and crushed stone and she fell; David, having cleaned up some of the gravel, went out of the house at about the time when the defendant left; the plaintiff's duties included picketing up after the children; the defendant, when she learned of the injuries, called to attend the plaintiff, Dr. Barton Smith, whom the plaintiff had not seen before; later the plaintiff consulted her personal physician, Dr. Lawrence Kvitka.
There was no other testimony as to how the plaintiff fell or the state of the playroom floor.
The plaintiff called Dr. Kvitka who testified to her injuries, care, and treatment. Neither side called Dr. Smith. The defendant testified that Dr. Smith had been and still was her family doctor, and that he was still practising in Dedham; also that on April 25, 1958, she took the plaintiff to the office of Dedham Medical Associates for X-rays.
1. The defendants' contention is that the case as it went to the jury 1 (a first count in negligence having been discontinued) was for breach of an assumed obligation to provide workmen's compensation benefits and that there is in law no such obligation. They contend that, in the light of the discontinuance of count 1, the declaration cannot rightly be construed to refer to negligence in respect of the condition of the playroom floor.
The charge shows that the trial judge construed the declaration as based on such negligence, and deemed its reference to G.L. c. 152 to be for the purpose of calling attention to the circumstance that, although under G.L. c. 152, § 1(4), the provisions of the chapter were elective as to the defendants, §§ 66 and 67 had deprived the defendants of the defences of contributory negligence, negligence of a fellow employee and assumption of risk.
The plaintiff contends that the issue of negligence was fully tried and that an amendment of the declaration should be allowed as a basis for overruling the exceptions. See Coburn v. Moore, 320 Mass. 116, 124, 68 N.E.2d 5 ( ). See also cases cited in Sandler v. Elliott, 335 Mass. 576, 589, 141 N.E.2d 367, as to power to amend in this court.
The declaration fails to state either 'concisely and with substantial certainty' or in any way at all any 'substantive facts necessary to constitute the cause of action' for negligence. G.L. c. 231, § 7, Second. In the circumstances of the discontinuance of the count for negligence and the consequent ambiguity of the case presented by the pleadings, as well as our views on the points discussed below, we prefer to follow Richards v. New York, N. H. & H. R. R., 328 Mass. 204, 206, 102 N.E.2d 769, and Kabatchnick v. Hanover-Elm Bldg. Corp., 331 Mass. 366, 374, 119 N.E.2d 169, and sustain the exceptions without ordering judgment for the female defendant. This will permit a new trial against her after such amendment as the Superior Court may allow.
Judgment, however, is to be entered for the defendant David B. Stone. Although it was agreed that both defendants were in control of the premises, there is no evidence which tends in any way to suggest a breach by him of any duty to the plaintiff.
2. In argument the plaintiff's counsel said, 'I wonder why they didn't bring him in, if this woman didn't fall down, if they didn't tell him that she slipped on the pea stone, if she didn't have a head injury and she didn't have a back injury.'
The judge in his charge instructed that ...
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