Florida Tel. Corp. v. Wallace

• Decision Date: 25 March 1932
• Citation: 140 So. 472,104 Fla. 566
• Parties: FLORIDA TELEPHONE CORPORATION et al. v. WALLACE.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

140 So. 472

104 Fla. 566

FLORIDA TELEPHONE CORPORATION et al. v. WALLACE.

Florida Supreme Court, Division B.

March 25, 1932

Error to Circuit Court, Lake County; J. C. B. Koonce, Judge.

Action by Ruby Wallace against the Florida Telephone Corporation and another. From judgment for plaintiff, defendants bring error.

Affirmed.

COUNSEL Duncan, Hamlin & Duncan, of Tavares, and E. W & R. C. Davis, of Orlando, for plaintiffs in error.

Buie &amp Hippler, of Eustis, for defendant in error.

OPINION

PER CURIAM.

Recovery in the sum of $5,000 was had in the circuit court of Lake county against the Florida Telephone Corporation and Florida Public Service Company. The action was for wrongful death of one Oswald Wallace, defendant in error's husband. Both defendants in the court below took writ of error.

An uninsulated telephone wire of the Florida Telephone Corporation passed under, but did not touch, a certain uninsulated hightension line of the power company in the streets of Eustis. Oswald Wallace was killed by coming in contact with the telephone wire while working on top of a tow-story building over which the telephone wire had been suspended. Both the telephone wire and the high-tension line were permitted by the two defendants to remain in close proximity to each other at a point where they intersected in the street, and it appeared that the telephone wire passed under the primary, and over the secondary, wires constituting a part of the power company's high-tension transmission system, making likely the dangerous contact of the two at any time.

Failure to prove that the negligent condition complained of was the proximate cause of death, and alleged contributory negligence of the person killed, were the defenses relied on to defeat recovery.

The evidence was conflicting, but there is substantial proof of the fact that deceased came to his death as the result of a violent electric shock communicated to his person from the high-tension lines of the power company by way of the telephone wire. Whether or not deceased accidentally came into contact with the telephone wire in the exercise of due care while engaged at work, on top of the building, or whether he negligently attempted to handle the telephone wire so as to change its position, thereby through his own carelessness bringing the telephone wire into contact with the power line, is a matter of sharp dispute in the testimony.

The conflict...