Nolan v. Bridgeton & Millvilde Traction Co.

• Decision Date: 04 March 1907
• Citation: 65 A. 992,74 N.J.L. 559
• Parties: NOLAN v. BRIDGETON & MILLVILDE TRACTION CO.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

65 A. 992

74 N.J.L. 559

NOLAN

v. BRIDGETON & MILLVILDE TRACTION CO.

Court of Errors and Anneals of New Jersey.

March 4, 1907.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Error to Circuit Court, Cumberland County.

Action by John Nolan against the Bridgeton & Millville Traction Company. From a judgment in favor of plaintiff, defendant brings error. Affirmed.

William A. Logue and Gaskill & Gaskill, for plaintiff in error. Matthew Jefferson and John W. Westcott, for defendant in error.

TRENCHARD, J. This writ of error brings under review a judgment of the Cumberland circuit court in favor of the defendant in error, the plaintiff below. The action was one of tort for negligence. Upon the trial there was evidence tending to prove the following facts: John Nolan, the plaintiff below, was engaged in the business of carting in the city of Bridgeton. The Bridgeton & Millville Traction Company, the defendant below, owned and occupied a plot of ground at the corner of South and Pamphylia avenues in that city, on which were erected the company's car barns and other buildings used by it. On January 3, 1902, Nolan was employed by one Reeves to deliver upon the premises of the defendant company certain ladders which Reeves had constructed for it. Nolan hauled the ladders to the company's car barn, and, after delivering them there, started to leave the premises by an old road or driveway which extended across the company's premises from the car barn to South avenue and which road or driveway Nolan and many others had frequently used before on the business of the company, and with the knowledge of the company. In this road or driveway, on the day of the accident, was a hole which Nolan did not observe. That this hole was caused by the removal of a pole from the ground by the defendant company. The wheel of Nolan's wagon struck the hole, tilted the wagon over, threw him out, breaking his leg, and otherwise injuring him. At the close of the plaintiff's testimony, a motion was made to nonsuit the plaintiff upon two grounds: First, that there was no evidence of negligence on the part of the defendant; and, second, that the evidence disclosed that the plaintiff was guilty of contributory negligence. At the end of the case a motion was made that a verdict be directed in favor of the defendant for the same reasons as were urged on the motion to nonsuit. Both of these motions were denied by the trial judge, and exceptions prayed and allowed, and the case was submitted to the jury. The jury found a verdict for the plaintiff below.

The questions raised by the assignments of error can all be considered under the assignments which challenged the correctness of the refusal of the trial judge to nonsuit and to direct a verdict.

The first question, therefore, is this: Was the defendant company negligent? If negligent at all, the company was negligent in failing to perform a duty which it owed to Nolan with regard to keeping its premises reasonably safe for his ingress and egress. The defendant company insists that it owed Nolan no such duty. By the settled law of this state an owner or occupier of lands, who, by invitation, express or implied, induces persons to come upon the premises, is under a duty to exercise ordinary care to render the premises reasonably safe for such purposes. Phillips v. Library Co., 55 N. J. Law, 307, 27 Atl. 478; McCormick v. Anistaki, 66 N. J. Law, 211, 49 Atl. 505; Ryerson v. Bathgate, 67 N. J. Law, 337, 51 Atl. 708, 57 L. R. A. 307. The gist of the liability in such cases consists in the fact that the person injured did not act merely on motives of his own, to which no sign of the owner or occupier contributed, but that he entered the premises because he was led by the acts or conduct of the owner or occupier to believe that the premises were intended to be used in the manner...