Mississippi Cottonseed Products Co. v. Harris

• Decision Date: 11 December 1939
• Docket Number: 33891
• Citation: 187 Miss. 138,192 So. 439
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: MISSISSIPPI COTTONSEED PRODUCTS CO. v. HARRIS

192 So. 439

187 Miss. 138

MISSISSIPPI COTTONSEED PRODUCTS CO. v. HARRIS

No. 33891

Supreme Court of Mississippi, Division B

December 11, 1939

APPEAL from circuit court of Hinds county HON. J. P. ALEXANDER Judge.

Personal injury action by William Dock Harris against the Mississippi Cottonseed Products Company, doing business as the Mississippi Cotton Oil Company. From an adverse judgment defendant appeals. Affirmed.

Affirmed.

Green Green & Jackson, of Jackson, for appellant.

We urged in the argument for the directed verdict that this case on the instant record was controlled by that of Dr Pepper Bottling Company v. Gordy, 174 Miss. 392, 164 So. 236, on the theory that it was the burden of the plaintiff in the instant case to prove that the injury of which he was complaining was the proximate result of some defect in the condition of the runway, what the nature of that defect was, and that such defect was one that might have been ascertained and discovered by the exercise of reasonable care of the employer. We urged in our argument and submit that it is the true rule, applicable in the instant case, that the master is not an insurer of an instrumentality furnished to the servant, but is only required to use reasonable care to see that such instrumentalities are reasonably safe.

Dr. Pepper Bottling. Co. v. Gordy, 174 Miss. 392, 164 So. 236.

Our defense was, is, and continues to be that there is no evidence to support and sustain the allegations of the declaration for the reason that as found for the defendant, Louis Hannah, this appellant was not guilty of any actionable wrong as charged in the declaration, because the runway was not shown by any proof to have been for any appreciable length of time prior to the fall of the plaintiff in any negligent condition, or in any need of repair or that such condition as the plank may have been in had existed for such a length of time that this defendant could have known of the condition of the runway that proximately contributed to the injuries that plaintiff complained of.

Furthermore, the proof for the plaintiff and on the entire record affirmatively shows that the condition of this runway in question just prior to the fall was not any different from the condition that had existed for a period of sixteen years prior to the time of the injury and that it was the duty of the plaintiff to have reported any discoverable defect to the appellant for necessary repairs. There was nothing in the evidence to show what caused the plaintiff to fall, whether it was his own act in springing on the board to attempt to get on top of the double conveyor, whether it was that the plank in some manner had been misplaced, or whether from some other unknown reason the plank and the plaintiff fell to the ground. There was nothing in the evidence or on this record that in any manner indicated that this defendant knew, or could have known, that there was anything wrong with the runway or that there was any requirement to repair, or that it was in fact in an unsafe condition.

Eagle Cotton Oil Co. v. Sollie (Miss.), 187 So. 506.

The master is not an insurer of the safety of the instrumentality furnished to the servant, nor of the place of work, and is only required to use reasonable care to furnish reasonably safe places to work. The master is not required to furnish the newest, best, and safest machinery, appliances, and place to work, but only such as are reasonably safe. It is absolutely necessary that actual or constructive notice of an alleged defect in a place of work must be not only pleaded but shown by reasonably credible...