Emery v. Chicago, R. I. & P. Ry. Co.
Decision Date | 18 December 1922 |
Docket Number | No. 23070.,23070. |
Citation | 296 Mo. 674,246 S.W. 335 |
Court | Missouri Supreme Court |
Parties | EMERY v. CHICAGO, R. I. & P. RY. CO. |
Appeal from Circuit Court, Buchanan County; L. A. Varies, Judge.
Action by Arthur Emery against the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railway Company. From a judgment for plaintiff, defendant appeals. Reversed.
John E. Dolman, of St. Joseph, for appellant.
Mytton & Parkinson, of St. Joseph, for respondent.
This is an action by respondent to recover damages for the loss of an eye alleged to have been destroyed while assisting in removing iron angle bars which connected the joints "of the iron rails of appellant's main line of track near Amity, Missouri. The accident occurred while respondent was striking the head of a steel chisel, held by another employé of appellant, with an iron sledge or maul. The chisel was shaped like a hatchet or wedge, had a wooden handle, and was being inserted between the web of the rail and the angle bar in order to drive the angle bar loose from the rail to which it was attached by an accumulation of rust. While striking the head of the chisel with the maul a piece of metal flew off (the evidence does not clearly disclose from where), striking respondent in the right eye.
The charge of negligence relied upon by respondent and submitted to the jury in the instructions given in his behalf is thus stated In the amended petition:
"* * * That the defendant and its servant, Charles McVicker, carelessly and negligently held the chisel while it was being struck with a maul in the hands of the plaintiff in an unsafe manner; and carelessly and negligently looked away and caused the chisel which he was holding to be moved as the plaintiff was in the act of striking the chisel with the maul, then and there causing the maul to strike against the head of the chisel and the rail in such a manner as to strike a glancing blow and cause pieces of iron to fly against and into the plaintiff's right eye."
The answer was a general denial coupled with pleas of contributory negligence and assumed risk.
The verdict of the jury was in favor of respondent for the sum of $12,000.00. From a judgment entered thereon appellant has prosecuted an appeal.
I. One of the contentions of appellant is that the court erred in not sustaining a demurrer to the evidence, interposed at the close of the whole case, upon the theory that respondent assumed the risk incident to the business of appellant as it was carried on. This calls for a review of the evidence.
The testimony of respondent was that he had been engaged in taking off angle bars and putting on new ones for a period of ten months before the injury; that sometimes he handled the chisel and sometimes the maul, but that he used the maul more frequently; that when the angle bars were stuck to the rail with rust the chisel would be inserted between the angle bar and the rail and then he hit with the maul or sledge; that at the time of the injury one Charles McVicker, another employé of appellant, was holding the chisel and respondent was handling the maul; that as respondent hit the chisel McVicker looked away and moved the chisel, raising the same and "I struck low on the chisel, a kind of glancing lick"; that a piece of metal thereupon flew in respondent's eye; that when the chisel was hit a square blow respondent had never had the experience of any iron flying up towards his eye; and that he had never before felt particles of iron or rust flying off.
Charles McVicker testified in part as follows:
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State ex rel. St. Louis-San Francisco Ry. Co. v. Cox
... ... Railroad, 315 Mo. 1199, 287 S.W. 1051; ... Quigley v. Hines, 291 Mo. 22, 235 S.W. 1052; ... Martin v. Railroad, 30 S.W.2d 741; Emery v ... Railroad, 296 Mo. 674, 246 S.W. 337; Pryor v ... Williams, 254 U.S. 43; McAdoo v. Auzellotti, ... 271 F. 268; Union Pacific Railroad ... ...
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Osborn v. Chicago, R.I. & P. Ry. Co.
... ... [1 S.W.2d 188] ... Hence it is urged by defendant that the plaintiff assumed ... such risk, as a matter of law, under the state rule or ... doctrine announced by this court in Harbacek v. Fulton ... Iron Works Co., 287 Mo. 479, 229 S.W. 803, and Emery ... v. Railway Co., 296 Mo. 674, 246 S.W. 335; and by the ... St. Louis Court of Appeals in Wulfert v. Construction ... Co., 232 S.W. 243. Plaintiff, on the other hand, insists ... that the risk from flying particles of clinkers was not ... ordinarily incident to plaintiff's employment as a ... ...
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Osborn v. Chicago, R. I. & P. Ry. Co.
...the state rule or doctrine announced by this court in Harbacek v. Fulton Iron Works Co., 287 Mo. 479, 229 S. W. 803, and Emery v. Railway Co., 296 Mo. 674, 246 S. W. 335; and by the St. Louis Court of Appeals in Wulfert v. Construction Co., 232 S. W. 243. Plaintiff, on the other hand, insis......
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