Huda v. American Glucose Co.

• Decision Date: 14 December 1897
• Citation: 154 N.Y. 474,48 N.E. 897
• Parties: HUDA v. AMERICAN GLUCOSE CO.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

154 N.Y. 474

48 N.E. 897

HUDA

v.AMERICAN GLUCOSE CO.

Court of Appeals of New York.

Dec. 14, 1897.

Appeal from supreme court, appellate division, Fourth department.

Action by Maryanna Huda, as administratrix, against the American Glucose Company. From a judgment for defendant, plaintiff appeals, and the appellate division ordered judgment entered for defendant (42 N. Y. Supp. 1126), and certified certain questions. Affirmed.

Le Roy Parker, for appellant.

John G. Milburn, for respondent.

GRAY, J.

The appellate division of the supreme, court in the Fourth department has certified to this court certain questions for review in an action brought to recover damages for the alleged negligence of the defendant, whereby the plaintiff's intestate lost his life. A verdict was directed at the circuit for the defendant upon the evidence, and the appellate division, after overruling the plaintiff's exceptions, which were ordered to be first heard there, unanimously ordered judgment to be entered for the defendant. A brief preliminary statement of the facts, as established upon the trial, will aid in the discussion of the questions certified. In the evening of April 12, 1894, the defendant's factory, in the city of Buffalo, was destroyed by fire. The building was eight stories in height, and occupied a space of 160 feet on Scott street by 200 feet in depth. The business conducted therein was the manufacture of glucose, and the deceased was one of the workmen employed. The fire was alleged to have originated in some defect in the electric plant used for lighting the building. When the fire broke out, the deceased was at work upon the sixth floor, and he, with some others, ran down the stairway to the fourth floor, where the thick smoke prevented their further progress. Some of them then broke through a window, and escaped to the ground by a fireman's ladder. The deceased was last seen near the foot of the stairway, and did not follow his companions to the window. What, in fact, happened then to him is not known, and becomes purely a matter of presumption. There were three distinct stairways in this building leading from the top floor to the bottom floor, and two leading from the top floor to a flat roof. A large covered bridge led from the fifth and sixth floors to an adjoining building, which many of the workmen had been in the habit of using as a means of access to and of return from the four upper stories. Upon the outside of the building were three fire escapes, extending from the roof to the ground; two being upon the south and one upon the north walls. Two windows upon each floor opened upon balconies which were constructed in connection with the fire escapes. In the process of the manufacture of glucose it was necessary that a high and uniform temperature should be kept up within the factory, and to that end the windows in the building were required to be kept closed. Directions to this effect being unobserved, at first strips of wood were so nailed to the sashes as to prevent the windows from being opened; but, these having been pried off at times, the more effective means had been resorted to, during the previous autumn, of screwing the sashes together, and notices were posted warning the workmen against opening or breaking the windows, under penalty of discharge. The windows in the building were constructed with two light sashes, containing, each, four panes of glass about 16 inches square. The cash frames were from an inch and a quarter to an inch and a half thick. The deceased had been working for the defendant for about 12 years, and the knowledge of the employés as to the fastening of the windows was testified to by several of the plaintiff's witnesses. When the fire occurred, the fire escapes were made use of by many by breaking through the windows, while some escaped by the stairways or by ladders. These facts are sufficient to inform us of the situation, and to enable us to consider the questions certified. They are: ‘(1) Whether the defendant's method of screwing down the windows of the building in which the deceased was employed, so that there was no access to the fire escapes except by breaking the windows, and forbidding the employés of the defendant engaged in that building from opening the windows, and requiring them to keep a high temperature in the work rooms, such as was necessary to accomplish the business carried on in these rooms, was a violation of the statute requiring a construction and maintenance of fire escapes on such buildings. (2) Whether doing the acts stated in the first question, or any of them, was evidence of negligence on the part of the defendant that should have been submitted to the jury. (3) Whether the deceased, who was familiar with the defendant's methods as stated in the first question, and for a long period had worked under and acquiesced in the conditions stated in the first question, assumed the risks of the situation; and whether, by reason thereof, the plaintiff is not entitled to recover in this action.’

The statute referred to in the first question (Laws 1892, c. 673, § 6) provided for the manner of construction of fire escapes upon factory buildings, and that they...