Byrne v. Boston Woven Hose & Rubber Co.
| Decision Date | 02 March 1906 |
| Citation | 191 Mass. 40,77 N.E. 696 |
| Parties | BYRNE v. BOSTON WOVEN HOSE & RUBBER CO. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
J. J. Feely and Roger Clapp, for plaintiff.
Conrad Reno and Jas. E. Cotter, for defendant.
This is an action of tort in two counts under Rev. Laws, c. 106, § 71, cls. 1, 2. At the trial in the superior court, the jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff; and the case is before us on the defendant's exceptions.
The injury occurred on March 16, 1904. The plaintiff, at this time, was 17 years old. He had worked as a printing press feeder for two years before entering the defendant's employ, and had worked for the defendant in the same capacity for three or four weeks before the day of the accident. On that day, after working on another press, he was set to work on the press which caused the injury. This press was two years old, and was adapted to printing small sheets. The plaintiff's duty was to place the papers in the press in such a way that the impression would be made, then removing them, and placing them in piles, and subsequently packing them in boxes. The impression was made on the paper by forcing the type down upon it by the application of a heavy weight. Beneath the case, and about two feet from the floor, was a counterweight which swung in a half circle. Power was transmitted to the press, for the purpose of operating it, by means of a belt running from a countershaft on the ceiling to a tight pulley on the right side of the machine. The machine was started and stopped by shifting the belt from a loose pulley to the tight pully, and vice versa and this was done by means of a shipper. It was also equipped with a brake which was intended to be automatically pressed against the fly wheel by the shifting of the belt, in order to stop the wheel with greater speed, the shipper and brake being made in one piece. It was impossible to stop the machine in any other way than by shifting the belt from the tight to the loose pulley.
This press had been broken some two or three weeks before the accident, and had been repaired by the foreman. At the time of the accident the machine was being used to print envelopes. After the plaintiff had been working for a few minutes and had printed 50 or 60 pieces, he noticed that the envelopes, as they came out from the press, were striking against the top of the feed board, which was too high, and were glancing off and falling down inside the machine, and that about 15 had already fallen. An accumulation of fallen matter inside the press had a tendency to impede its proper working, if not removed. Accordingly, the plaintiff stopped the machine. He threw off the shipper with his left hand thereby removing the belt to the loose pulley, and, after that had been done, he placed his left had upon the fly wheel and stopped that, as the brake did not bring it to an immediate stop of itself. After 30 or 40 seconds the machine came to a full stop, and after waiting a half minute more to ascertain that the stop was complete, the plaintiff put his right hand inside to remove the fallen matter. As he was doing this, the machine suddenly and without warning, started, the counterweight swung up, and the plaintiff's hand was caught and crushed between this counterweight, and the body of the press.
While the defendant took many exceptions at the trial, it has confined its argument to two exceptions. The first exception is that the judge instructed the jury that if the press started of its own accord, after it had been properly stopped, this fact unexplained was some evidence of negligence on the part of the defendant. The judge immediately afterwards added: 'If you find that the shipper was pushed back to the extreme limit in its proper way, then the fact that it started up is in itself some evidence of a defect somewhere, that is to say, of the existence of a defect about the machine, and some evidence of negligence on the part of the defendant, of its superintendent, in...
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