Polansky v. Heller

• Decision Date: 09 June 1922
• Parties: POLANSKY v. HELLER.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

241 Mass. 484

135 N.E. 572

POLANSKY

v.HELLER.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Essex.

June 9, 1922.

Report from Superior Court, Essex County: Nelson P. Brown, Judge.

Action by Dora Polansky against Jacob S. Heller for personal injuries sustained by falling down a flight of stairs in a building owned by defendant, while plaintiff was calling on a tenant having a place of business therein. Reported from the superior court after a directed verdict for defendant, with stipulation that, if the case should have been submitted to the jury, judgment is to be entered for plaintiff for $250, with costs and interest; otherwise, judgment for defendant.

The evidence showed that the hallway on the second floor was dark, and that the front and rear stairs were close together, and that plaintiff, who had gone up the front stairs, fell down the rear stairs.

McSweeney & McSweeney and Abraham Glovsky, all of Salem, for plaintiff,

Ruth R. Heller, of Roxbury, for defendant.

DE COURCY, J.

The defendant owns a four-story brick building on Salem street in Boston. The first floor is occupied as a store; the second is rented to one Silver, a tailor, for his business and residence; and the floors above are let by the defendant for dwelling purposes. Access to the upper portion of the building is through an entrance hallway, from which a flight of 15 steps leads to the second floor. From the hall at the head of this stairway, a rear flight of steps leads down to the back door and yard. This second floor hallway is about 3 feet wide; and the rear stairway cuts into it, so that at the top it is within 16 inches of the last riser of the front stairway. The plaintiff testified that one afternoon in November, 1917, she had occasion to go to the premises of Silver, on business; that she went up the front steps to the hallway on the second floor; that she took one step, and her foot ‘went into the cut-in area of the back stairs, and she was precipitated down the flight of back stairs.’ There was evidence that the defendant retained control of the halls and stairways, which were used in common by all the occupants of the building, and that at the time of the accident there was no artificial light in said hallway, and but little illumination from the overhead skylight. The uncontradicted testimony of the defendant was that the building was in the same condition as when constructed and rented; that these hallways were lighted, if at all, by the tenants; and that he assumed no duty in this respect.

In the absence...