Butts County v. Hixon

• Decision Date: 10 August 1910
• Citation: 68 S.E. 786,135 Ga. 26
• Parties: BUTTS COUNTY v. HIXON.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

68 S.E. 786

135 Ga. 26

BUTTS COUNTY v. HIXON.

Supreme Court of Georgia

August 10, 1910

Syllabus by the Court.

The plaintiff sued the county of Butts to recover damages for injuries received on account of the defective condition of a public bridge built by the county authorities since December 29, 1888. She alleged that the insecure condition of a hand railing on the side of the bridge, upon which she placed her hand for support while crossing the bridge at night, caused her to move towards the center of the bridge, and in doing so her foot became entangled in the rotten and jagged end of a beam on the floor of the bridge, causing her, without fault on her part, to fall and sustain the injuries for which she brought suit. She further alleged that the defective condition of the bridge was due to the negligence of the county authorities in failing to repair it, after knowing, or being charged with knowledge, of its unsafe condition. The plaintiff obtained a verdict, and the defendant excepted to the court's refusal to grant its motion for a new trial. Held, where two acts of negligence concur in producing an injury, in the absence of either of which the injury would not have occurred, and both acts are chargeable to the same person, the doctrine of proximate cause is not applicable; and where acts charged as negligence consist in the failure to remedy two defects in a public bridge, which would not constitute negligence until the county authorities charged with the repair of such bridge had actual or constructive notice thereof, and both defects combine in causing an injury, which would not have occurred had either not existed, the fact that the county authorities are charged with knowledge of only one of such defects will not excuse the county from liability. 1 Thompson on Negligence, § 69; Kraut v. Frankfort, etc., R. Co., 160 Pa. 327, 28 A 783.

(a) The following charge of the court: "In this case, if there was a defect in this bridge because of a beam placed there by authority of the county authorities, and it was suffered to decay and become rotten, and on that account it became dangerous, then if the county authorities, the county commissioners, had notice of it, or either of them, or if that condition remained for a sufficient length of time for them to discover it in the exercise of ordinary care, which would be notice to them, and if the plaintiff was injured on account of the defect, she would be entitled to recover"--was not subject to the criticism that it was error "for the reason that it is not adjusted to the issues in this case. The plaintiff alleges in her petition and her proof tends to show, that she came in contact with two defects in the bridge, the loose railing and the beams of wood laid across the bridge, and that both these defects contributed to her injury." Nor was such charge subject to the criticism that it was error because it "in effect instructs the jury that it was not necessary that the county authorities should have notice, either actual or constructive, of the defective condition of the railing which she alleges was defective, and which, according to her allegations and proof, contributed to her injury."

The refusal of the court to rule out the evidence of a witness for the plaintiff, "That bridge was rebuilt in 1891," upon objection of the...