Patzke v. Minneapolis & St. Louis Railway Company
| Decision Date | 06 January 1911 |
| Docket Number | 16,805 - (153) |
| Citation | 129 N.W. 124,113 Minn. 168 |
| Parties | EMMA PATZKE v. MINNEAPOLIS & ST. LOUIS RAILWAY COMPANY |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Action in the district court for Carver county to recover $15,000 for personal injuries and $500 on account of expenses incurred thereby. The facts are stated in the opinion. The case was tried before Morrison, J., and a jury which returned a verdict in favor of plaintiff for $15,000. From an order denying defendant's motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict or for a new trial, it appealed. Affirmed.
New trial -- evidence.
In this, a personal injury action, the plaintiff had a verdict for $15,000. Held, that the trial judge did not abuse his discretion in denying the defendant's motion for a new trial, on the ground that the verdict was not sustained by the evidence and that the damages were excessive.
W. H Bremner and George W. Seevers, for appellant.
Thos F. Craven and W. C. Odell, for respondent.
On October 11, 1907, about ten o'clock in the morning, the plaintiff was a passenger upon one of the defendant's railway trains from Chaska to Merriam Junction, and was seriously injured in alighting from the train at her destination. This action was brought in the district court of the county of Carver to recover damages for the injuries so sustained, on the alleged ground that the defendant negligently failed to stop the train a sufficient length of time to enable her to alight safely therefrom, but that, on the contrary, it started the train suddenly, without warning, while she was in the act of stepping from the platform of her car, whereby she was thrown from the car. The defendant by its answer denied any negligence on its part, and alleged that the plaintiff's injuries were the result of her own negligence.
The result of the first trial of the action was a verdict for the plaintiff for $7,500, which was set aside and a new trial granted by the trial court. On the second trial there was a verdict for the plaintiff for $12,000, and defendant appealed from an order denying its blended motion for judgment or a new trial. This court ordered a new trial, on the ground that the testimony of the plaintiff as to the way she was injured was practically uncorroborated and so manifestly against the great preponderance of the evidence that it was an abuse of discretion to deny the motion for a new trial. See 109 Minn. 97, 123 N.W. 57. Upon a third trial of the case a verdict was returned for the plaintiff for $15,000, and the defendant appealed from an order denying its motion for judgment or a new trial.
The assignments of error raise the general question whether the verdict is sustained by the evidence. It is not a case where the record discloses no evidence tending to support the verdict; hence the defendant is not in any event entitled to judgment notwithstanding the verdict. The question in its last analysis is whether the verdict is so obviously and palpably against the great weight of the evidence that it was an abuse of discretion on the part of the trial judge not to grant the defendant a fourth trial.
It appears from the record in this court on the first appeal that the plaintiff testified that she did not attempt to leave the car until it stopped at the station platform; that a man and a woman, she did not then know where they lived, went down the car steps ahead of her; that she followed them, but the car started while she was going down the steps and threw her down. The persons who preceded her were not called as witnesses on the second trial, and the result was that the plaintiff's testimony as to the details of the accident was practically uncorroborated, a circumstance to which we gave much importance on the first appeal. In this respect the evidence was materially different on the third trial.
The plaintiff on that trial testified, in reference to the way in which she was injured, substantially the same as on the second trial, and to the effect following: That when the station was called and the car door opened, she gathered up her packages and started to leave the car; that a man and woman (Mr. Norris and his sister, Mrs. Gilbert) went ahead of her, and she followed them; that they went down the platform steps before she did; that the car was standing still when she...
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