Corcoran v. McNeal
| Decision Date | 03 June 1960 |
| Citation | 161 A.2d 367,400 Pa. 14 |
| Parties | John CORCORAN, Appellee, v. Arnold McNEAL, Ind. and trading as 'Palm Gardens', Appellant. |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
J. Harold Hughes, Chester, for appellant.
John S. J. Brooks, Hilferty, Brooks & Knapp, Media, for appellee.
Before CHARLES ALVIN JONES, C. J., and BELL, MUSMANNO, BENJAMIN R JONES, COHEN and EAGEN, JJ.
John Corcoran, the plaintiff in this case, was struck and seriously injured by Russell Wall, a patron of the Palm Gardens, a tavern owned and operated by Arnold McNeal, the defendant. Corcoran brought an action of trespass against McNeal and was awarded a verdict of $16,801. The defendant appealed, seeking judgment n. o v., or, in the alternative, a new trial.
Reading the record sur judgment n. o. v., with all factual disputes and conflicting inferences resolved in favor of the verdictwinner, the following narrative emerges from the record. On October 20, 1956, John Corcoran, accompanied by his brother-in-law Stephen Lennon, entered 'Palm Gardens' a basement tavern in Chester, and ordered beer and hamburger sandwiches which they received and consumed. About a half hour later they proceeded to leave the tavern by ascending the steps leading to the outside door. While in the rathskeller they had noticed a visibly intoxicated person of imposing physical proportions boisterously disturbing other guests, shoving them 'back and forth.' He stood about 6 feet high, weighed some 220 pounds and was 'powerfully built,' with 'big arms and big chest'. He maneuvered unsteadily on his feet, his voice was thick, and he drank vodka served to him by one of the bartenders.
When Corcoran and Lennon started up the flight of 14 steps, Wall followed them, offering offensive remarks. When they had reached a half-way point up the steps, Wall, without provocation, struck Lennon who retreated down the steps to the bar, complaining to the bartender and asking for assistance. The bartender ignored Lennon. His fellow bartender offered a similar deaf ear.
During the time Lennon was remonstrating with the uninterested dispensers of alcohol at the bar, he first heard anguished cries of 'Oh, oh' from Corcoran, followed by what he described as a thump. He ran to the steps and got there in time to find Corcoran lying on the floor in a pool of blood, Wall standing over him, with clenched fist. Lennon returned to ask the bartenders to summon the police, but the bartenders were interested in other affairs. Lennon then called the police himself from a pay station in the tavern, after which he returned to his companion who, unconscious, lay on the floor, blood seeping from his mouth, ears and nose. Fearing Corcoran might be dying, Lennon pleaded that he be taken to the hospital. Wall resented Lennon's lamentations and struck him two or three times, adding: 'If you don't shut up, I will do the same to you.'
The defendant contends on appeal that since no one actually saw Wall deliver the blow or blows which felled Corcoran, the jury's verdict as to what happened was a mere guess. A guess is an airy nothing resting on a non-existent base. The jury's finding that Wall was responsible for Corcoran's injuries was not a guess; it was a conclusion based on unrefuted and irrefutable circumstances. For fifteen or twenty minutes before Corcoran started for the steps, Wall had been acting in a belligerent manner, molesting and interfering with other patrons. He loudly ordered and noisily consumed a beverage not famous for any tranquilizing effect. After consuming the vodka, he drunkenly made his way to the steps and there, without cause, struck at Lennon. A few moments later, as Lennon grieved by the side of the prostrate body of his brother-in-law, Wall struck him again and hurled the threat already quoted: 'If you don't shut up, I will do the same to you.'
What more could any impartial tribunal need in the way of evidence to fasten upon Wall accountability for Corcoran's condition? He was the only one in the staircase with Corcoran; he was the only one in the tavern who, because of immediately preceding events, was resolved to violence and mischief, he was the only one to openly boast admission for what had occurred.
The tavern-owner presents a rather strange argument in this connection. He says:
'Where there is but one conclusion from an inference it is the duty of the judge to draw that conclusion and not for the jury.'
But surely the defendant cannot mean to argue that it was the duty of the Judge to impose liability on the defendant in a trespass case! In assumed relevancy he cites Anthony Wayne Terrace Housing Association v. Bedio, 186 Pa.Super. 335, 142 A.2d 482. That case is so obviously irrelevant to the point in issue that it would be a waste of time to dwell on it. It is enough to say that there the plaintiff brought an action of ejectment against the defendant to recover certain premises. The Court, after hearing evidence, directed a verdict for the plaintiff because there was no factual dispute. The defendant there argued the case should have gone to the jury. In the case here the question of liability did go to the jury.
There is no restriction as to what an attorney may argue in his brief but it would seem that a slight regard for logic and the value of paper would deter counsel from citing cases which are as far removed from the immediate controversy as water is from vodka.
Of course, it could be argued, as the defendant does, with some paltry obeisance to relevancy, that Corcoran was injured not because of being struck by Wall but as the result of a scuffle. There was no substantive evidence to that effect but if surmise is to be projected through the curtain of the suppositious, one could insist that, in spite of Wall's admitted aggression, Corcoran had scuffled with Wall and came into his injuries as the result of falling down the stairs. But even that argument would not save the defendant from liability under the circumstances because McNeal's liability does not ride on Wall's pugilistic fists. His accountability for the harm done Corcoran attaches because the jury found he had failed in two important responsibilities: One, he neglected to protect his patrons from foreseeable damage inflicted by intoxicated and unruly persons in his establishment; and two, he, through his bartender, served intoxicating liquor to a visibly intoxicated patron at his bar.
The Act of April 12, 1951, P.L. 90, Article IV, Sec. 493, 47 P.S. 4-493(1), provides:
'It shall be unlawful: (1) for any licensee or the board, or any employee, servant or agent of such licensee or of the board, or any other person, to sell, furnish or give any liquor or malt or brewed beverages, or to permit any liquor of malt or brewed beverages to be sold, furnished or given, to any person visibly intoxicated * * *' (Emphasis supplied.)
If Wall was already intoxicated when the defendant's bartender served him vodka and, because of his intoxication, he caused injury to Corcoran, it would not matter how or in what manner the injury was inflicted since the proprietor of the tavern would be liable in damages to the injured party in any event. An intoxicated person amid a group of people is a constant source of danger and hurt to those about him. He is the proverbial bull in china shop and, of course, it is clear that when the owner of a bull is sued for damages done by his animal he cannot expect to escape liability by demanding proof as to how the bull smashed the china. He is liable for allowing the bull to be abroad unrestrained, unfettered and uncontrolled. The proprietor of an establishment whose employees pour inflammable liquid into a vessel already too full cannot plead ignorance of results when the vessel explodes from contact with the slightest spark.
The liability of a tavern proprietor for damage done a patron under the circumstances herein discussed does not depend on the statute of 1951 or any statute.
In the case of Rommel v. Schambacher, 120 Pa. 579, 11 A. 779, a drunken rowdy, Edward Flanagan, in a spirit of humorless levity, pinned a piece of paper to the clothing of William Rommel, and set it afire. Before the ensuing flames could be extinguished Rommel had been seriously burned. He sued the owner of the tavern in which the incident occurred. The trial court entered a non-suit. This Court reversed, pointing out that if the proprietor of the tavern was guilty of making Flanagan drunk or even if Flanagan came into the taproom drunk and the proprietor knew this, it was his obligation to see to it that he did no injury to his customers. Speaking through Chief Justice Gordon, this Court said:
By way of illustration, Chief Justice Gordon referred to the case of Pittsburg & Connellsville R. Co. v. Pillow, 76 Pa. 510, where a railroad passenger lost an eye as the result of a drunken row between other passengers, in which row he was not involved at all. In that case this Court said:
'The plaintiff lost his eye through the quarrel of a couple of drunken men, who should not have been permitted aboard the cars, or, if so permitted, should have been so guarded or separated from the sober and orderly part of the passengers that no injury could have resulted from their brawls.'
Applying the principle there involved to the Rommel case, Chief Justice Gordon said:
'If, then, a railroad company is...
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