Philadelphia, B. & W.R. Co. v. Crawford

• Decision Date: 04 February 1910
• Parties: PHILADELPHIA, B. & W. R. CO. v. CRAWFORD.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

77 A. 278

112 Md. 508

PHILADELPHIA, B. & W. R. CO. v. CRAWFORD.

Court of Appeals of Maryland

February 4, 1910

Appeal from Circuit Court, Talbot County; James A. Pearce and Wm. H Adkins, Judges.

Action by Earl Crawford by next friend against Philadelphia Baltimore & Washington Railroad Company. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appeals. Reversed and remanded.

Argued before BOYD, C.J., and BRISCOE, SCHMUCKER, BURKE, THOMAS PATTISON, and URNER, JJ.

William Mason Shehan and James C. Mullikin, for appellant.

William S. Evans and Harry Covington, for appellee.

SCHMUCKER J.

The appellee recovered a judgment in the circuit court for Talbot County, against the appellant railway company for damages for an assault and battery, and false arrest and imprisonment. The suit was instituted in the circuit court for Cecil county and then removed first to Queen Anne's county and afterwards to Talbot county, where its trial before a jury on the general issue plea resulted in the judgment from which the appeal was taken.

The events out of which the cause of action arose formed the closing scenes of a trip of a party, consisting of members of an amateur dramatic association, from Elkton to Havre de Grace on March 5, 1907. After having a performance at the last-named town the party went to the appellant's station for the purpose of returning to Elkton by the midnight train. While they were waiting in the station for the arrival of the train a disturbance occurred which resulted in the arrest of one of the party, named Green, by W. N. Baldwin, a night officer of the railway company, whose duty it was to keep order in and around the station.

After the arrest and removal of Green, the equitable plaintiff, Earl Crawford, in company with another member of the party named Jones, started from the station to go into the town of Havre de Grace for a purpose apart from their proposed railway journey. At or near the division line between the railway property and the public streets of the town they met a municipal night officer named Kelley with whom Jones entered into a conversation, which resulted in an altercation that led to his arrest by Kelley. Baldwin, the appellant's night officer, having been drawn to the spot by the controversy between Jones and Kelley arrested Crawford, and the two young men were taken by the officers to the town lockup and imprisoned in it for the night.

There is evidence in the record tending to prove that it was the duty of Baldwin as night officer of the appellant to keep order at its station building and grounds, and to protect passengers and persons waiting there to take passage on its trains from injury and abuse. There is also evidence tending to show that the arrest of the equitable appellee was made upon the station property, and other evidence tending to show that it was made beyond the limits of that property upon a public street of the town. The evidence is also conflicting as to his conduct and attitude at the time of his arrest.

At the close of the case in the court below the plaintiff offered four prayers, all of which were granted by the court. The defendant offered six prayers of which the first, second, and fifth were rejected and an instruction given by the court to the jury in lieu of the fifth prayer. The third, fourth, and sixth prayers were granted. The plaintiff's prayers were as follows:

"(1) If the jury believe from the evidence that the plaintiff on the 5th day of March, in the year 1907, was on one of the approaches to the station of the defendant at Havre de Grace, and that said approach was in the occupancy and under the control of the defendant, with the intention of taking passage on one of its trains, he was then a passenger of the defendant and it was bound to exercise all reasonable care to protect him from personal insult, injury, and abuse; and if they shall find that the plaintiff while he was on said approach to the defendant's station for the purpose aforesaid was without any reasonable cause assaulted by one of the defendant's officers, agents, or employés while acting within the scope of his employment, then the plaintiff is entitled to recover.

"(2) If the jury believe from the evidence that the plaintiff on the 5th day of March, in the year 1907, was a passenger of the defendant and on one of the approaches to its station at Havre de Grace, and that said approach was in the occupancy and control of said defendant, with the intention of taking passage on one of its trains to Elkton, then he was entitled to protection by the defendant from insult, injury, and abuse; and if the jury find that the plaintiff, while a passenger as aforesaid, without any reasonable provocation, was assaulted and imprisoned by one of the defendant's officers, agents, or employés, in charge of its said station and approaches as aforesaid, while acting within the scope of his employment, then the plaintiff is entitled to recover.

"(3) If the jury find from the evidence that Baldwin on the night of March 5, 1907, was an officer, agent, or employé of the defendant company and in charge of the station, grounds, and approaches in the control and occupancy of said defendant at Havre de Grace, and shall further find that the plaintiff at the time of his arrest, as testified to in this case, was on ground and approaches to said station that were in the control and occupancy of said defendant, and was a passenger of said defendant and behaving all the while in an orderly and proper manner, then it is for the jury to decide from all the facts and circumstances in the case whether or not when the plaintiff was so arrested, as testified to in this case, the said Baldwin in making said arrest was acting as an officer, agent, or employé of the defendant, and if they shall find that said Baldwin in making said arrest of the plaintiff was acting as an officer, agent or employé of said defendant within the scope of his employment, then the verdict of the jury shall be for the plaintiff.

"(4) If the jury shall find for the plaintiff, then in assessing the damages they are to take into consideration the nature of the force applied to the plaintiff, Crawford, his sense of indignity and humiliation, and award him such sum as under all the circumstances of the case they may deem a fair and reasonable compensation therefor."

We find no error in the granting of those prayers. Most of the propositions which they embody were considered at length and passed upon by us in the case of the present appellant v Green, 110 Md. 32, 71 A. 986. That suit was instituted by Henry M. Green a member of the same dramatic association for his arrest and imprisonment already referred to in the station, on the same night, while the party were waiting for the arrival of the train to Elkton, by the same officer of the railroad company, assisted by the same special officer of the town. The legal principles involved in the two cases, so far as they relate to the arrest and imprisonment, are the same, although their facts differ in that Green was confessedly in the station building when arrested, while in the present case there is a conflict of evidence as to whether Crawford was upon the station property or the...