Brooks v. Yazoo & M. V. R. Co.

• Decision Date: 08 July 1916
• Docket Number: 18341
• Citation: 111 Miss. 793,72 So. 227
• Parties: BROOKS v. YAZOO & M. V. R. CO
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

72 So. 227

111 Miss. 793

BROOKS v. YAZOO & M. V. R. CO

No. 18341

Supreme Court of Mississippi

July 8, 1916

APPEAL from the circuit court of Bolivar county, HON. W. A. ALCORN Judge.

Suit by Nancy Brooks, Administratrix, against the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley Railroad Company. From a judgment for defendant plaintiff appeals.

The appellant, as plaintiff, filed her declaration in the circuit court alleging that one John Brooks, an employee of the defendant railroad company, which was a common carrier engaged in interstate commerce, between the states of Mississippi and Arkansas, while engaged in repairing trestle work on an incline of the defendant's roadway leading down to the ferry on the Mississippi river, was injured by stepping on the end of a cross-tie which was not fastened and caused the plaintiff's decedent to slip and fall and receive injuries from which he suffered great bodily and mental pain and anguish for a period of several months, and up until his death several months after the injury, which injury is alleged to have been the proximate cause of the death, and recovery is asked both for the pain and suffering of the deceased prior to his death and for the loss to his family consisting of plaintiff, his wife, and several small children.

The action is brought under the Federal Employers' Liability Act, as amended April 5, 1910, the section relied on for recovery for deceased's suffering being as follows:

"That any right of action given by this act to a person suffering injuries shall survive to his or her personal representative for the benefit of the surviving widow or . . . children of such employee, and, if none, then of such employee's parents; and, if none, then to the next of kin dependent upon such employee; but in such cases there shall be only one recovery for such injuries."

It is alleged in the declaration that the defendant was under obligation to furnish the deceased a safe place to work which the defendant failed to do, and, for its negligence in not furnishing such safe place for the deceased to work became liable for damages.

There was testimony of a physician tending to show that the death of the deceased was not due to the injury, but to appendicitis. The case was submitted to a jury under instructions of the court, and from a verdict for the defendant, the plaintiff appeals, assigning, among other errors, the action of the court in giving instruction "k"...