Paducah L. & P. Co. v. Parkman's Admr.

• Decision Date: 02 December 1913
• Court: Kentucky Court of Appeals
• Parties: Paducah Light & Power Company v. Parkman's Administrator.

156 Ky. 197

Paducah Light & Power Company v. Parkman's Administrator.

Court of Appeals of Kentucky.

Decided December 2, 1913.

Appeal from McCracken Circuit Court.

WHEELER & HUGHES for appellant.

CAMPBELL & CAMPBELL and HAL S. CORBETT for appellee.

OPINION OF THE COURT BY JUDGE CARROLL — Affirming.

The appellant company is engaged in the business of manufacturing and selling electric light and power in Paducah, and maintains a line of poles upon which its wires are strung. The Paducah Home Telephone Company operates a system of telephones in Paducah, and at 28th and Jefferson Streets the wires of the telephone Company are attached to the pole upon which the light and power company has it wires. At this point the wires of the telephone company are only a few inches from those of the light and power company.

In January, 1913, the deceased, Emmet Parkman, while attempting to use the telephone in the office at the fair-grounds in Paducah, was shocked and killed by an electric current that passed from the heavily charged electric wire of the light and power company to the wire of the telephone company at 28th and Jefferson Streets, and was carried by the telephone wire into the office and to the telephone which Parkman was attempting to use.

This action was brought by his administrator against the light and power company, the telephone company, and the Paducah Traction Company that also used for its wires the pole before mentioned, to recover damages for his death. The negligence charged in the petition was that these companies, and each of them, were guilty of gross carelessness and negligence in failing to have their respective wires properly protected so as to prevent the telephone wires from becoming charged with currents of electricity from the wires of the other companies.

On a trial before a jury there was a verdict in favor of the traction company, and a verdict and judgment for $8,000 against the telephone company and for $4,000 against the light and power company. On this appeal by the light and power company the only ground of reversal relied on is that the trial court, in the instruction defining the care to be exercised by it, imposed a higher degree of duty than the law applicable to the case authorized. The instruction advised the jury that it was the duty of the light and power company to exercise the "utmost care," while it contends that it was only required to exercise "ordinary care." The instruction complained of reads as follows:

"The court further instructs you that it was the duty of defendant, Paducah Light & Power Company, at the time and place complained of by plaintiff, if it jointly with defendant, Paducah Home Telephone & Telegraph Company, used poles for the purpose of stringing wires thereon, to exercise the utmost care in the maintenance of such poles, and the use of its wires strung on such poles, and to prevent its wires from touching or coming in contact or becoming connected with the wires of defendant, Paducah Home Telephone & Telegraph Company, and charging its wires with a current or voltage of electricity, and if you so believe from the evidence in this case that defendant failed to exercise such care, and by reason of such failure the defendant's, Paducah Home Telephone & Telegraph Company, wires became charged with a high and dangerous voltage or current of electricity, which was conveyed to the place where plaintiff's decedent was killed, and by reason thereof, and as the direct and proximate result of such failure on defendant's part plaintiff's decedent, while using the telephone of the Paducah Home Telephone & Telegraph Company, was shocked and killed, then defendant, Paducah Light & Power Company, is chargeable with negligence, and the law is for the plaintiff and you will so find as against the Paducah Light & Power Company."

Counsel for the light and power company admit that it is the duty of electric companies to exercise the utmost care and skill in the management and care of their wires so as to prevent injury to their servants or others whose business may bring them in contact with the wires, but they insist that this high measure of duty and care does not exist when the injury complained of is caused by coming in contact with harmless wires of other companies that the heavily charged wires of the electric company by touching impart danger to. And the argument is made that in this class of cases it is only the duty of...