Louisville & N.R. Co. v. Keith

• Decision Date: 03 October 1900
• Citation: 58 S.W. 468
• Parties: LOUISVILLE & N. R. CO. v. KEITH. [1]
• Court: Kentucky Court of Appeals

58 S.W. 468

LOUISVILLE & N. R. CO. v. KEITH. ^[1]

Court of Appeals of Kentucky.

October 3, 1900

Appeal from circuit court, Jefferson county, common pleas division.

"Not to be officially reported."

Action by Ellen Keith against the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company to recover damages for personal injuries. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appeals. Reversed.

Lyttleton Cooke and Edward W. Hines, for appellant.

A. T Burgenin and Matt O'Doherty, for appellee.

BURNAM J.

This is a suit to recover damages for personal injuries alleged to have been received by plaintiff in alighting from one of defendant's trains. The trial by a jury resulted in a verdict for the plaintiff for $3,000, and defendant appeals. The facts of the case, as shown by the testimony, are that on the 5th day of August, 1897, plaintiff bought a ticket from defendant's agent at Elizabethtown for South Park, with the assurance from the agent that she would be allowed to get off at Coral Ridge, the station where she desired to stop. The train ran about 100 yards beyond the usual stopping place at Coral Ridge before it was checked up, and when the train stopped the step of the coach in which appellee was riding was about 2 or 2 1/2 feet from the ground. The conductor says that he offered to have the train backed to its usual stopping place, but that appellee, who had followed him out of the car and was standing upon the steps, said that she would get off where the train stood; and his statements on this point are corroborated by the newsboy, Fitzpatrick, and also by the engineer in charge of the train. Appellee and her son testify that, when she got out on the steps for the purpose of alighting, she remarked to the conductor that it was a rough place to get off, and that in response thereto he said that he thought she could do so with his assistance with safety; and that thereupon he took hold of her right arm, and assisted her down; and that she weighed 250 pounds, and was pregnant, and that she delivered a child five months thereafter; and that when she lit upon the ground she felt a jar and stinging sensation in her legs, which caused her great pain at the time, and which had continued ever since and which finally made her limp, and incapacitated her in a large degree from performing her domestic duties and walking around. She also testifies that she was unable to move from the spot for 15 or 20 minutes after the train left. It appears from the testimony for appellant that the train arrived at Coral Ridge about 10 o'clock in the morning and that the place where the appellee alighted was not a rough one, and that there was no reason why appellee, with ordinary care on her part, should not have alighted at that point with safety. It also introduced testimony which conduces to show that she made no complaint at that time of any injury, and continued to perform her usual duties. Dr Ritter, who examined her just before he testified, said that she had varicose veins in both legs; that this was frequently the result of pregnancy, and was not the result of any sudden distension of the veins occasioned by a sudden jerk. The only reason offered for supposing the varicose condition of the veins of the appellee's legs at the time of the trial was caused by stepping from the car was the burning sensation she felt at the...