Munroe v. Pa. R. Co.

• Decision Date: 16 March 1914
• Citation: 90 A. 254,85 N.J.L. 688
• Parties: MUNROE v. PENNSYLVANIA R. CO.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

90 A. 254

85 N.J.L. 688

MUNROE

v. PENNSYLVANIA R. CO.

Court of Errors and Appeals of New Jersey.

March 16, 1914.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Appeal from Circuit Court, Essex County.

Action by Lucius M. Munroe against the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. From a judgment of nonsuit, plaintiff appeals. Reversed.

Horace C. Grice, of Newark, and George W. Glaze, of New York City, for appellant. Vredenburgh, Wall & Carey, of Jersey City, for appellee.

MINTURN, J. The judgment of nonsuit was directed at the circuit upon the following facts: The plaintiff's decedent, Lewis C. Greene, while waiting at the station at Elizabeth, on the night of June 1, 1911, for a New York train, was injured by the "Federal Express," running an hour behind its schedule time, and passing the station at the rate of a mile a minute. The accident occurred after half past 11 at night, while the deceased with his wife, son, and others, who were returniug from a wedding function at Elizabeth, were waiting for a train due to arrive there at 12:04. The deceased occupied his time conversing with other members of the party, and stood about three feet back from the edge of the platform. There are four elevated tracks at the station, and a short distance therefrom these tracks describe a curve of about 1,000 feet, measured on the rail from a point at the north where it meets the straight track, to the point on the south where it converges and again meets the straight track. In this situation the Federal Express, without warning of any kind, suddenly reached the vicinity of the platform, where the deceased was standing, and the situation which its presence under those circumstances produced is described by Dr. Her, one of the witnesses: "Now, when I yelled, it seemed to me momentary when the train whizzed by. I saw one or two jump back; I couldn't say either one or two, but one in particular jumped back as though he was in danger; he put his hands up to his hat, and with a twisting motion always towards me. I had got about the middle of the waiting room, and I saw this body come whirling toward me. He seemed to be going in toward the train. Thinking he was caught in the suction of the train, I ran toward him. Just before reaching him, at a point south of the waiting room, this body seemed to collapse and shoot along the platform with the force of a catapult. Thinking that he had lost control of his body and the suction force of the wind drawing him in toward the train, I threw myself on his body to hold him there, so that he wouldn't be drawn in under the wheels; that was the thing in my mind. I know I was exceedingly close to the train, and my hat was taken away, my coat was thrown up over my head, and I lay there until after the train went by on his body, and then, throwing down my coat, I saw who the man was. He did not seem to breathe, and I ran my hand up under his coat. There was a trickle of blood out from under the skull, and the man to all appearances was dead." The deceased was not drawn under the train, as a result of the suction, nor so far as any witness could testify did anything strike him. The effect of the medical testimony was that the skull was fractured, and a large section of the bone was gone, as the result of a blow sufficient to force the man's skull asunder, and to lacerate and destroy a large area of the brain, and cause a violent hemorrhage.

The plaintiff's witnesses testified that no warning whatever was given of the approach of the train. One witness testified that all he heard in the way of warning of the approaching train was a "whining" and a "buzzing," and the...