Haynes v. City of Hillsdale

• Decision Date: 25 May 1897
• Citation: Haynes v. City of Hillsdale, 113 Mich. 44, 71 N.W. 466 (Mich. 1897)
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: HAYNES v. CITY OF HILLSDALE.

71 N.W. 466

113 Mich. 44

HAYNES v. CITY OF HILLSDALE.

Supreme Court of Michigan

May 25, 1897

Error to circuit court, Hillsdale county; Victor H. Lane, Judge.

Action by Mary E. Haynes against the city of Hillsdale. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff brings error. Reversed.

W. J. Sampson and F. H. Stone, for appellant.

Chester & Twiss, for appellee.

LONG C.J.

The plaintiff lived about six miles from the city of Hillsdale. She was injured on a sidewalk in the defendant city. On a trial before a jury, verdict was rendered in favor of the defendant. It appears that July 27, 1894, while the plaintiff was passing along the walk in front of the courthouse, a board in the walk before under her weight, her foot caught under the next board, turning that over, and she fell forward, receiving severe injuries, for which suit is brought. The walk was constructed of wooden stringers running lengthwise, with boards about six inches wide nailed crosswise. The center stringers had entirely rotted away with age, and the outside ones were but little better. The board which broke had rotted away on the underside, until, but a mere shell of sound wood remained on the upper surface. The street on which the accident occurred is named "McCullum Street." The streets on the sides of the courthouse square are Broad and Howell streets.

The entire walk on McCallum street, from Broad to Howell street was built in 1873; and plaintiff offered to show that it had remained without being repaired or rebuilt since that time. This walk is about six rods in length between those streets. This evidence should have been permitted. The declaration charges that the defendant permitted a section of said walk east of and near Howell street, to become and remain out of repair, rotten, loose, and dangerous, and the boards and stringers composing the same to become and remain loose rotten, broken, and torn up, and liable to tip up, turn over and spring down when pedestrians were passing along and over the same. The declaration also charges notice to the city of such condition, and its knowledge of such condition. It was shown that, at the place where the accident happened,-that is, the section on McCullum street, east of and near Howell street,-the walk would shake when walked over, and, if walked over near the ends of the boards, the opposite end would fly up; that the nails were out, and would not hold in the stringers when driven in; that...