Hodges v. Bearse
| Decision Date | 16 May 1889 |
| Citation | 21 N.E. 613,129 Ill. 87 |
| Parties | HODGES v. BEARSE. |
| Court | Illinois Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from appellate court, First district.
Stiles & Lewis, for appellant.
Brandt & Hoffmann, (Joseph N. Barker, of counsel,) for appellee.
This was an action on the case, brought by Elizabeth Bearse against Leonard Hodges, to recover damages for a personal injury received by the plaintiff by means of the fall of a passenger elevator on the premises of the defendant. On the 17th day of December, 1886, the date of the injury, the defendant was, and for several years had been, the owner of a large five-story brick tenement house on the corner of Indiana avenue and Twenty-Second street, Chicago. The upper stories of said building were divided into apartments, which were usually rented to and occupied by tenants, and at the date of said injury the plaintiff and her sister were tenants of the defendant, occupying rooms in the fifth story of said building. For the convenience of his tenants, and others desiring to use it, the defendant had caused a passenger elevator to be constructed in said building, and the same was being operated by one of the defendant's employés. On the evening of the day above mentioned the plaintiff and her sister, for the purpose of being conveyed to the fifth floor of the building, entered said elevator, and while they were going up, the elevator proved to be unmanageable, so that the employé in charge was unable to stop it, and it continued on until it collided with the works overhead, and then fell, seriously injuring the plaintiff. The declaration charges negligence in the defendant in failing to provide a strong, substantial, and safe elevator, with proper safety appliances and machinery attached, in failing to employ safe and trustworthy servants and agents to manage the same, and also negligence on the part of the servant in charge of the elevator in not using proper care and diligence in running and operating it. The defendant pleaded not guilty, and on trial before the court and a jury the issues were found for the plaintiff, and her damages assessed at $10,000. From this sum the plaintiff remitted $3,000, and the court, after denying the defendant's motion for a new trial, gave judgment in favor of the plaintiff for $7,000, and costs. On appeal to the appellate court said judgment was affirmed, and by a further appeal the record is now brought to this court.
The counsel for the defendant strenuously insisted in the trial court, and insist here, that there is no evidence which, when properly construed, has a tendency to sustain the charges of...
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