City of Logansport v. Green, 23860.

• Decision Date: 09 June 1922
• Docket Number: No. 23860.,23860.
• Citation: 135 N.E. 657,192 Ind. 253
• Parties: CITY OF LOGANSPORT v. GREEN.
• Court: Indiana Supreme Court

192 Ind. 253

135 N.E. 657

CITY OF LOGANSPORT

v.GREEN.

No. 23860.

Supreme Court of Indiana.

June 9, 1922.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Miami County; Chas. A. Cole, Judge.

Action by Mabelle Green, administratrix of the estate of Harry M. Green, deceased, against the City of Logansport. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appeals. Affirmed.

E. P. Kling, of Peru, and R. C. Hillis, of Logansport, for appellant.

Rabb, Mahoney & Fansler, of Logansport, for appellee.

EWBANK, J.

This was an action against the appellant city for damages for negligently causing the death of Harry M. Green, by electrocution. The complaint charged that the appellant city operated an electric light and power plant, and maintained a line of poles on Twenty-Second street, in the city of Logansport, on which were hung certain wires, known as arc wires and primary wires, respectively, that carried dangerous and deadly currents of electricity of 2,300 volts or more, and also a service wire leading from a transformer to the residence of patrons carrying electricity for domestic use, which was designed to carry only 110 volts, an amount that would not kill nor seriously injure a person coming in contact with the wire; that said Green owned and occupied a residence on Smead street, near Twenty-Second street, and was a patron of appellant, who furnished him with electric current for lighting his residence at fixed rates; that said low voltage service wire running from the transformer along Twenty-Second street was diverted and passed along Smead street to his said residence; that said high voltage wires carrying the dangerous currents of electricity and said low voltage service wire extending to his residence were so negligently maintained by the appellant city, suspended from short cross-arms on the same poles, so near each other and so close to and extending through the branches of living trees growing on said streets, that currents of electricity were liable to be and were thereby transmitted through the branches of such tress from the wires carrying high and deadly currents to the one which extended to said residence; that all of said facts were well known to appellant city; that on July 3, 1919, by reason of said negligence of appellant in so maintaining its electric wires, it negligently permitted the said dangerous and deadly current of electricity to escape from its said high voltage wires into and over said low voltage service wire and into the residence of said Green, where it set fire to the paper lining of a water pipe with which the drop cord and wire screen surrounding an electric light bulb were in contact, and when Green, in ignorance that such deadly current of electricity had been carried into his residence, or that the cord and wire screen were charged with electricity, touched the screen to withdraw it from the burning paper, the deadly current of electricity killed him; and that his death was proximately caused by said negligence of the appellant city.

Appellant moved to make the complaint more specific, and reserved an exception to the order overruling its motion. After the return of a verdict in favor of the plaintiff (appellee) for $8,000, appellant filed a motion for a new trial, specifying as errors the giving of certain instructions, the refusal to give certain others, and the admission of certain evidence. This motion was overruled, and appellant excepted. Overruling the motions to make the complaint more specific and for a new trial, respectively, are the only alleged errors discussed in appellant's brief.

[1] The motion to make the complaint more specific asked that the plaintiff be required to state from which of the wires carrying a high voltage current the electricity escaped into the service wire, to state the location of the tree through which it escaped, the period of time during which it had been escaping, and just how, in detail, the high and deadly current could be transmitted and how it actually was transmitted, either from the arc wire or the primary wire to the service wire.

Without stopping to consider whether or not there was merit in any specifications of this motion, it is sufficient to say that appellant was not harmed by the ruling complained of. The undisputed evidence showed that the service wire was hung on the same poles as the arc wires and primary wires for the distance of only one-half square, from the transformer in the middle of the block on Twenty-Second street to the corner of Twenty-Second and Smead streets, where the service wire turned and ran west along Smead street, while the high voltage wires continued north on Twenty-Second street; and that there was only one tree in that half square, which was a water elm tree that stood near the corner of Smead and Twenty-Second streets, and in the six years since it was planted (which was after the electric light wires were hung) had grown to seven inches in diameter, and so tall that its branches extended up among the wires and sometimes touched them, and that some of its top branches were found to be slightly burned after the death of plaintiff's decedent. And the defendant produced several witnesses who were employed in its lighting department in...