Chattanooga Elec. Ry. Co. v. Boddy

• Decision Date: 08 October 1900
• Parties: CHATTANOOGA ELECTRIC RY. CO. v. BODDY.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

58 S.W. 646

105 Tenn. 666

CHATTANOOGA ELECTRIC RY. CO. v. BODDY.

Supreme Court of Tennessee.

October 8, 1900

Appeal from circuit court, Hamilton county; Floyd Estell, Judge.

Action by Isaac Boddy against the Chattanooga Electric Railway Company. From a judgment in favor of plaintiff, defendant appeals. Reversed.

Brown & Spurlock, for appellant.

Bloom & Boddy and Pritchard & Sizer, for appellee.

BEARD J.

The defendant in error boarded a car of the plaintiff in error which ran north on Whiteside street, in Chattanooga. His point of destination was the intersection of that street with Lewis street. When this place was reached, the car was stopped and he was invited to alight. To do this he passed to the back platform, and thence down the steps. After reaching the ground, and while the car was standing still, he passed around its rear end, intending to cross (as was his habit and as his business called him) to the far side of Whiteside street. About 18 inches or 2 feet from the track on which the car stood which he was leaving, there ran a parallel track used for the passage of the cars of the same company. In the act of stepping between the rails of this parallel track, he was struck by a south-bound car, which was running at such a rate of speed that, after having knocked him down, it dragged him a very considerable distance before it could be brought to a standstill. The result was serious personal injuries for which he obtained a substantial recovery in this action. Upon this appeal in error by the railway company a number of assignments of error were made upon the action of the trial court, only one of which will be embraced in this written opinion. The others, being less important, will be disposed of orally.

The trial judge, after properly saying to the jury that if they found that plaintiff and defendant were guilty of negligence which contributed proximately to the injury, or if they found that want of care on the part of the plaintiff was the proximate cause of the accident, the action must fail, then added: "If the proof shows that the plaintiff was a passenger on one of the defendant's cars, and he had alighted from the car upon which he had been transported, and in attempting to leave the point of his destination, to go to his business, he was injured by another car being operated by the defendant company, while attempting to cross behind the car from which he had alighted, *** he would still be considered a passenger, *** and the defendant would owe him a high or extraordinary degree of care to protect him. *** He has the legal right to cross the track and go to his destination in safety, and the defendant was bound, in the highest degree, that he was exposed to no peril." It is obvious that the situation in which the plaintiff was placed just before and at the moment he received this injury, while such as to require prudence on his part, at the same time imposed the duty of diligent attention upon the...