Griffin v. Springfield St. Ry. Co.

• Decision Date: 23 October 1914
• Citation: 106 N.E. 551,219 Mass. 55
• Parties: GRIFFIN v. SPRINGFIELD ST. RY. CO.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

219 Mass. 55

106 N.E. 551

GRIFFIN v. SPRINGFIELD ST. RY. CO.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Hampden.

October 23, 1914

COUNSEL

A. R. Bostick and C. G. Gardner, both of Springfield, for plaintiff.

Henry W. Ely and Jos. B. Ely, both of Westfield and Springfield for defendant.

OPINION

RUGG C.J.

The plaintiff seeks to recover damages for personal injuries sustained while a passenger upon one of the street cars owned and operated by the defendant. The evidence tended to show that the car was of the ordinary type of closed car, with a vestibule at each end. The usual signal to start the car was given just as the plaintiff had gotten into the body of the car 'and was about to take a seat,' or 'was about to sit down on one of the seats running lengthwise of the car,' and that then 'the car started with a jerk by reason of which the plaintiff was violently thrown backwards' and injured. She was 65 years old, in good health and physical condition. The plaintiff's daughter testified that, as her mother was about to sit, 'the car gave a terrible jerk * * * and * * * threw her to the floor.' In answer to the question whether there was anything to direct her attention to the force or kind of jerk, she answered:

'I noticed that it was more than an ordinary jerk when it threw her down; it would have thrown myself down, but I grabbed hold of the car * * * to save myself.'

This testimony is almost in the same words as that held in Craig v. Boston Elevated Railway, 207 Mass. 548, 93 N.E. 575, not to entitle the plaintiff to go to a jury. If this was all there was to the plaintiff's case, she would be precluded from recovery by the authority of that decision.

That case is illustrative of many which have come before this court where a plaintiff by the use of violent descriptive epithets as to the nature of the starting of the car, together with testimony of injury, has sought to sustain his burden of proof. Uniformly it has been held that that is not enough. Anydody standing in an electric car is liable to be thrown off his balance and to fall as a result of such starts and jerks. Most of these cases are collected and reviewed in McGann v. Boston Elev. Ry., 199 Mass. 446, 85 N.E. 570, 18 L. R. A. (N. S.) 506, 127 Am. St. Rep. 509; Work v. Boston Elev. Ry., 207 Mass. 447, 93 N.E. 693, and Martin v. Boston Elev. Ry., 216 Mass. 361, 103 N.E. 828.

In its last analysis the principle upon which these and like plaintiffs have rested has been that of res ipsa loquitur. It is that principle which has been decided to be inapplicable (unless there is further evidence) to those ordinary starts and jerks which everybody knows have been common incidents of travel upon electric cars. But it has been recognized expressly or impliedly in such decisions that they depend upon the degree of perfection in electrical science as applied to the uses of common carriers and the reasonable possibility of preventing such starts and jerks. It was said in Hunt v. Boston Elev. Ry., 201 Mass. 182, at page 185, 87 N.E. 489, at page 490:

'There is every probability that these are necessary in the present state of

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