Flynn v. Boston & M.R.r.
| Decision Date | 07 January 1910 |
| Citation | 204 Mass. 141,90 N.E. 521 |
| Parties | FLYNN v. BOSTON & M. R. R. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
E. M. Shanley, for plaintiff.
Archibald R. Tisdale, for defendant.
The plaintiff's intestate, James Flynn, was employed by the Standard Oil Company to weigh oil, or perform other light work as he might be directed. In the performance of his duties as weigher, he worked in a building used as a filling or shipping house, which is referred to in the exceptions as 'the platform room or covered platform.' In close proximity to this building, the door of which opened onto it was a railroad track, used to run tank cars to the works where they were loaded, or unloaded, as the oil company might direct. Directly opposite to the covered platform was an open platform, upon which movable skids were placed extending across the track to the doorway of the building, affording when the track was not in use a convenient means of communication. Among other duties, the decedent usually removed and replaced the skids, whenever cars were to be run in or out of the yard. By some omission or oversight, the skids had not been removed, on the day of the accident before a train came in made up of a shifting engine, with 'about seven cars.' In coming in, the train broke apart, leaving two cars connected with the engine, while the remaining cars running on a downgrade struck the skids with such force as to break and throw them behind the trucks to the ground. The evidence was conflicting, but the jury could find that the conductor, who stood on the tank car at the extreme rear, and saw the skids, upon ascertaining that they had been struck, and this part of the train stopped by the collision, and setting of the brakes on the car, called to the decedent, who was in the covered platform, 'to come and pick up the skids.' It appears that the platform of the tank car when the car stopped was not only opposite to the doorway, but extended its entire width, leaving a space of about five inches between the wall and the car. A finding would have been warranted that the only practicable method of quickly reaching the skids was to pass over the car to the further side of the track and the 'outside' platform. It was while attempting to cross, and as he stepped on and took hold of the iron railing, that the engineer in obedience to a signal from the brakeman backed down to recouple the detached cars. The impact forced the tank car suddenly forward, causing the decedent to lose his footing. In falling, he was caught and rolled between the wall and the car, receiving severe injuries. The evidence of the conductor as to his conduct is inconsistent with the evidence of the other witnesses, and there was testimony that when the tank car had been stopped, and while the decedent in his presence was getting on in response to what had been said, the conductor before he had fully boarded the car, or reached a place of safety, signaled the brakeman, who obeyed the order to couple the cars. It is manifest upon this evidence, and the inferences which could have been properly drawn, that it could not have been ruled as matter of law, as the defendant contends, that Flynn either was negligent, or assumed the risk. The car was stationary, the conductor in control of the movements of the train was present, and the skids were behind the car on the track from whence he had been asked to remove them. When viewed in the light of common experience, and the ordinary prudence of men, the decedent would be justified in assuming that under these conditions the conductor would not deliberately give an order, the result of which, as he should have known, would cause the car to move suddenly, exposing him to the chance of being injured,...
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