Irwin v. Louisville & N.R. Co.

• Decision Date: 10 June 1909
• Citation: 50 So. 62,161 Ala. 489
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court
• Parties: IRWIN v. LOUISVILLE & N. R. CO.

50 So. 62

161 Ala. 489

IRWIN v. LOUISVILLE & N. R. CO.

Supreme Court of Alabama

June 10, 1909

Appeal from Law and Equity Court, Morgan County; Thomas W. Wert Judge.

Action by Roxie Irwin against the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company. From a judgment for defendant, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Wert &amp Lynn, for appellant.

John C Eyster, for appellee.

MAYFIELD J.

The appellant, as a passenger, sued the appellee, as a railroad common carrier, to recover damages for personal injuries received and suffered by her, while a passenger on its train as the result of being struck by a missile that came through the window of the car, and also by flying glass knocked from the window by the missile. The missile was evidently thrown through the window from without by some miscreant, a third party.

Railroad companies, as common carriers of passengers, are perhaps not bound to protect their passengers from injuries by third persons to the same extent and degree as from like injuries by their own agents or employés, yet they must use a high degree of care to prevent such injuries by strangers; but if the carrier or its agents have no knowledge of the condition of danger to which the passenger is subjected, and could not reasonably have anticipated the injury, or provided against it, the carrier is not and ought not to be liable for an injury suffered by a passenger at the hands of a stranger. But the carrier is under the duty to protect its passengers from all dangers which are known, or which by the exercise of a high degree of care ought to be known, whether occasioned by its own servants or by strangers. And if the injury suffered by the passenger is the result of the concurring negligence of a stranger and its own, the carrier is liable. Elliott on Railroads, § 1639; Hutchinson on Carriers (1906 Ed.) § 913.

Carriers are required to provide for passengers vehicles as safe as skill and foresight can reasonably make them, and the various appliances with which these vehicles are equipped must be kept in a safe and suitable condition; and if a passenger suffers an injury in consequence of any defect or unsafe condition of the vehicles, carriages, or cars, or of the appliances thereof, the carrier is liable therefor. The carrier is not, however, charged with the duty of providing or maintaining vehicles or appliances which will absolutely prevent injury to passengers. This would probably be impossible. If not, it is too high a duty to impose upon the carrier. But the carrier is required to provide cars and appliances "of the most approved type in general use by others engaged in a similar occupation," and, having so provided, it must exercise a high degree of care to maintain and...