Hunicke v. Meramec Quarry Co.

• Decision Date: 01 December 1916
• Docket Number: No. 18982.,18982.
• Citation: 189 S.W. 1167
• Parties: HUNICKE v. MERAMEC QUARRY CO.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

189 S.W. 1167

HUNICKE v. MERAMEC QUARRY CO.

No. 18982.

Supreme Court of Missouri, Division No. 1.

December 1, 1916.

Appeal from St. Louis Circuit Court; Leo S. Rassieur, Judge.

Action by August Hunicke, as administrator of the estate of Fred R. Hunicke, deceased, against the Meramec Quarry Company. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff appeals. Reversed and remanded.

This suit originated in the circuit court of Jefferson county, and is to recover from the defendant the sum of $10,000 damages for the death of Fred R. Hunicke (who had been most grievously injured while in the employ of the company) through the alleged negligence of the latter in not furnishing him with prompt emergency or first aid assistance and surgical assistance upon that occasion.

This is the second appeal of this case to this court. The opinion written on the former appeal is reported in 262 Mo. 561, 172 S. W. 43, L. R. A. 1915C, 789, Ann. Cas. 1915D, 493. Upon that occasion the judgment of the trial court sustaining the motion for a new trial was affirmed, and the cause remanded for further proceeding according to the views expressed in that opinion. In response to the mandate, a new trial was had, which resulted in a verdict and judgment for the defendant, and the plaintiff again duly appealed the cause to this court. The pleadings in the case are the same as when it was here on the former appeal, and the evidence is substantially the same, strengthened probably in some degree in favor of the plaintiff, but that fact in no manner effects the question presented by this appeal. The facts of the case are fully stated in the former opinion, and no good purpose would be served by a repetition of them here; so they are omitted from this statement of the case.

Joseph Wheless, of St. Louis, for appellant. Watts, Gentry & Lee and J. E. Carroll, all of St. Louis, for respondent.

WOODSON, J. (after stating the facts as above).

I. There is but one legal proposition presented by this record for determination, and that is the ruling of the court in refusing instruction numbered 1, asked by counsel for plaintiff, and in giving in lieu thereof, for plaintiff, instruction marked 1a, and in giving for defendant instruction numbered 3, in harmony therewith.

Instruction 1a reads as follows:

"The court instructs the jury that, if you believe and find from the evidence that on March 12, 1909, Fred R. Hunicke was in the employ of the defendant, Meramec Quarry Company, at a stone quarry owned or operated by it in Jefferson county, and that while so employed said Fred was injured as shown in the evidence, and that he was injured to such an extent that he was incapacitated from caring for himself, and that an emergency was thus created which demanded prompt surgical and medical treatment in order to stop the flow of blood from his wound and save his life, then it became and was the legal duty of the defendant corporation, through its officers or employés at the place of accident, to exercise ordinary care and diligence to secure for him such surgical and medical aid...