Liebrecht v. Crandall
| Decision Date | 22 April 1910 |
| Docket Number | 16,546 - (78) |
| Citation | 126 N.W. 69,110 Minn. 454 |
| Parties | WILLIAM LIEBRECHT v. WILLIAM R. CRANDALL |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Action in the district court for Blue Earth county to recover $5,000 damages for personal injuries sustained by defendant driving his automobile upon plaintiff as the latter was alighting from a street car on a certain street crossing. In his answer defendant denied that plaintiff alighted at the place alleged, and that defendant negligently or wantonly struck plaintiff, and alleged that plaintiff negligently alighted from a street car traveling in the same direction as defendant in his automobile while the street car was traveling at its customary speed, and not at any place where passengers were supposed to or did alight from said car, and carelessly and without using his eyes or ears to ascertain the presence of danger, alighted from said car immediately in front of defendant's vehicle and so close thereto that it was impossible to avoid colliding with him. The reply was a general denial. The case was tried before Pfau, J., and a jury which returned a verdict in favor of plaintiff for $300. From the judgment entered pursuant to the verdict, defendant appealed. Affirmed.
Negligence -- Question of Fact.
Defendant was driving his automobile on one of the principal streets of Mankato, following a street car, at the rate of about twenty miles an hour, and ran into and severely injured plaintiff as he stepped from the car, which had stopped at the street crossing to permit him to alight. Held, that the evidence of defendant's negligence presented a question of fact.
Contributory Negligence -- Submission to Jury.
Though plaintiff did not, at the time or before he stepped to the street from the car, look in the direction from which the automobile was approaching, he was not, as a matter of law guilty of contributory negligence. The question was properly submitted to the jury.
A. R. Pfau, Jr., W. A. Plymat, and C. J. Laurisch, for appellant.
Chris Carlson and Dunn & Carlson, for respondent.
This action was brought to recover for personal injuries alleged to have been received by plaintiff by reason of the negligence of defendant in the operation of his automobile. Plaintiff had a verdict. Defendant moved for judgment notwithstanding the same, which was denied. Judgment was thereafter entered for plaintiff upon the verdict, and defendant appealed.
Defendant contends that the evidence is insufficient to sustain the allegation of negligence relied upon by plaintiff; that the evidence is conclusive of plaintiff's contributory negligence; and that, therefore, defendant's motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict should have been granted. This presents the only question in the case, and we are unable to adopt the view of defendant.
It appears that plaintiff had taken passage on one of the street cars operated on the principal street of Mankato, and as it approached Spring street, the point at which he intended to leave the car, he signaled for it to stop. The car came to a stop at the usual place, and plaintiff alighted. As he did so, and before he had fully landed in the street, with one foot on the ground and the other on the car step, he was struck by defendant's...
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