Missouri Pac. R. Co. v. Hall
| Decision Date | 19 November 1923 |
| Docket Number | (No. 256.) |
| Citation | 255 S.W. 707 |
| Parties | MISSOURI PAC. R. CO. v. HALL. |
| Court | Arkansas Supreme Court |
Appeal from Circuit Court, Franklin County; James Cochran, Judge.
Action by James Hall against the Missouri Pacific Railroad Company. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appeals. Reversed and cause remanded for a new trial
James Hall sued the Missouri Pacific Railroad Company to recover damages for personal injuries alleged to have been received by him while in the employment of the defendant and to have been caused by the defendant's negligence. It appears from the pleadings and the proceedings throughout the case that the action was based upon the statutory liability created under the act of Congress commonly referred to as the federal Employers' Liability Act (U. S. Comp. St. §§ 8657-8665).
The plaintiff and several other employees, who were working with him and who witnessed the accident, testified in his behalf at the trial. It appears that the plaintiff was injured while he and another section man were throwing ties out of a box car. A work train was unloading ties between Mulberry and Ft. Smith, Ark., for the purpose of putting the ties in the railroad track. The ties were being unloaded as the train moved along at a speed estimated from two, three, or four miles per hour. The work train had been unloading ties for two or three days, and had gone from the Mulberry section to the Dyer section towards Van Buren. The train would move forward a short distance and stop. The section men kept throwing out the ties whether the train stopped or was in motion. One of the section crew would take hold of the front end of the tie, and another the rear end of it, and then walk to the side door of the car, and, after giving the tie a swing, would throw it on the ground. On the morning of the accident, Hall was the front man, and, just as they went to swing the tie out of the door, the train came to a stop, and Hall's hand caught between the end of the tie and the facing of the door of the car. The car was an ordinary box car with side doors, so that the workmen could not tell when the train was going to stop. While Hall and his fellow workman were in the act of throwing the tie from the car after giving it a swing, the train was stopped with a sudden jerk, which caused his hand to be caught between the end of the tie and the door facing of the car. The work train took up all the slack when it was stopped. The jerk was of a more sudden and violent kind than was usual when the train was stopped.
According to the evidence for the defendant, the work train was stopped in the usual and customary way. There was no jerk which was more sudden and different from the ordinary jerk caused by the train's being stopped. Other facts will be stated or referred to in the opinion. The jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff, and from the judgment rendered the defendant has appealed.
Pryor & Miles, of Ft. Smith, for appellant.
Geo. G. Stockard, of Van Buren, for appellee.
HART, J. (after stating the facts as above).
It is conceded that the action was brought under the federal Employers' Liability Act, and that in such cases it has been held by the Supreme Court of the United States and by this court that the work of repairing the roadbed and bridges of a railroad after they have become instruments of interstate commerce, and maintaining them in proper condition for the passage of interstate trains, is within the federal statute. Pedersen v. Delaware, L. & W. R. Co., 229 U. S. 146, 33 Sup. Ct. 648, 57 L. Ed. 1125, Ann. Cas. 1914C, 153; Illinois Central Railroad Co. v. Behrens, Adm'r, 233 U. S. 473, 34 Sup. Ct. 646, 58 L. Ed. 1051, Ann. Cas. 1914C, 163; Southern Pacific Co. v. Industrial Accident Commission of the State of California, 251 U. S. 259, 40 Sup. Ct. 130, 64 L. Ed. 258, 10 A. L. R. 1181; Erie Railroad Co. v. Collins, 253 U. S. 77, 40 Sup. Ct. 450, 64 L. Ed. 790; Long, Adm'r, v. Biddle et al., 124 Ark. 127, 186 S. W. 601; Treadway v. St. L., I. M. & So. Ry. Co., 127 Ark. 211, 191 S. W. 930; and Kansas City Southern Ry. Co. v. Leinen, 144 Ark. 454, 223 S. W. 1.
But it is insisted by counsel for the defendant that the evidence is not legally sufficient to sustain the verdict within the principles of law above announced. We cannot agree with counsel in this contention. The complaint alleges and the answer admits that at the time the plaintiff was injured, and for several years prior thereto, the Missouri Pacific Railroad Company was a corporation engaged in the business of transporting passengers and freight for hire as a common carrier by railroad in interstate commerce from Coffeyville, Kan., to Little Rock, Ark. It appears from the testimony of two of the witnesses for the plaintiff that, at the time the plaintiff was injured, he was unloading ties from a work train, and that the ties were to be used for the purpose of repairing the railroad track. The work was being done on the Mulberry and Dyer sections between Mulberry and Van Buren in the state of Arkansas.
The section foreman of the defendant testified that he had been working for the defendant as section foreman for 26 years, and was with the work train on the morning the defendant was injured. On cross-examination he was asked how long he had been working for...
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