Bloomer v. Snellenburg
| Decision Date | 20 April 1908 |
| Docket Number | 72 |
| Citation | 69 A. 1124,221 Pa. 25 |
| Parties | Bloomer v. Snellenburg, Appellant |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
Argued March 25, 1908
Appeal, No. 72, Jan. T., 1908, by defendant, from judgment of C.P. No. 4, Phila. Co., Sept. Term, 1906, No. 2,560, on verdict for plaintiff in case of Bridget D. Bloomer v. Nathan Snellenburg et al., trading as N. Snellenburg & Co. Affirmed.
Trespass to recover damages for personal injuries. Before AUDENREID J.
The facts are stated in the opinion of the Supreme Court.
Verdict for plaintiff for $3,000, on which judgment was entered for $2,000, all above that amount having been remitted.
Error assigned was in submitting the case to the jury.
The assignments of error are overruled and the judgment is affirmed.
George L. Crawford of Crawford & Loughlin, for appellants. -- Upon the plaintiff's testimony the facts as to how she stumbled are full and clear, and the questions of the defendant's negligence and her contributory negligence upon her admitted testimony, are entirely of law and not of fact, to be disposed of by nonsuit or by binding instructions: Farley v. Traction Co., 132 Pa. 58; Strayline v. Phila., 15 Pa. Dist. Rep. 387; Robb v. Connelsville Borough, 137 Pa. 42; McIlhenney v. Phila., 214 Pa. 44; Decker v. East Washington Borough, 21 Pa.Super. 211; Sickels v. Phila., 209 Pa. 113; Wall v. Lit, 195 Pa. 375; Seddon v. Bickley, 153 Pa. 271; Green v. R.R. Co., 214 Pa. 240; Hart v. Grennell, 122 N.Y. 371 (25 N.E. Repr. 354); Diver v. Singer Mfg. Co., 205 Pa. 170; Howell v. Union Traction Co., 202 Pa. 338; Crocheron v. Ferry Co., 56 N.Y. 656; Larkin v. O'Neill, 119 N.Y. 221 (23 N.E. Repr. 563).
Arthur S. Arnold, with him John D. Bloomer, for appellee. -- The circumstances surrounding this woman at the time of the accident make it a case for the jury. There was no legal negligence on her part. She testified she was giving due attention to her progress through the store: Polenske v. Lit Brothers, 18 Pa.Super. 474; Quirk v. Siegel-Cooper Co., 43 A.D. 464 (60 N.Y.S. 228); Hendricken v. Meadows, 154 Mass. 599 (28 N.E. Repr. 1054); Gardner v. Waterloo Cream Separator Co., 111 N.W. 316; Brown v. Stevens, 136 Mich. 311 (99 N.W. Rpr. 12); Becker v. Philadelphia, 212 Pa. 379.
Before MITCHELL, C.J., BROWN, MESTREZAT, POTTER and ELKIN, JJ.
The plaintiff in this case entered the department store of the defendants for the purpose of making purchases. While walking along one of the principal aisles in the store, she stumbled upon an obstruction or inequality in the passageway, caused by an incline which passed from a floor at a higher level at the left side of the aisle, to a point even with the passageway, at or near the right side. The sides of the incline facing the direction from which those using the passageway approached were perpendicular, and varied in height from about eight inches at one side down to a point at the other. There was no guard rail or warning, and nothing to indicate to those passing, the presence of this obstruction upon the floor, extending nearly across the aisle. Plaintiff charges that the placing of such an unguarded obstruction in the passageway was not a reasonable thing to do, and therefore constituted negligence. It is certainly true that where the owner or occupier of premises, in the prosecution of his own purposes, invites another to come upon the premises, he cannot with impunity expose the visitor to an unreasonable risk of any sort, as, for example, to an open hole in a passageway, or to a rope or other obstacle stretched across the aisle, liable to trip the foot. Had the obstacle in this case been of so pronounced a character, no one could question its unreasonableness.
The learned trial judge was of the opinion that under the facts established by the evidence, with regard to the location and character of the obstruction, negligence might be inferred from its existence, and in a very careful charge pointing out that ...
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