Prange v. McLaughlin
| Decision Date | 17 May 1935 |
| Docket Number | No. 136.,136. |
| Citation | 178 A. 782 |
| Parties | PRANGE et al. v. MCLAUGHLIN. |
| Court | New Jersey Supreme Court |
Syllabus by the Court.
Where there is evidence that a dangerous condition has been created in a sidewalk due to the breaking of the cement caused by the repeated and continued driving of heavy trucks over the curb and sidewalk, at a point not constructed for that purpose for the benefit of the owner, and there is evidence that the owner had knowledge of such improper use of the sidewalk for his benefit over a period of years, and of the dangerous condition resulting therefrom, held, that a question for the jury was presented as to the participation of the owner in the creation of a nuisance and his consequent liability to one injured by the dangerous condition.
Appeal from Circuit Court, Hudson County.
He further said that the sidewalk was not broken when his father, the appellant, came into possession of the property, and that he observed, at various times, from his father's apartment, the sidewalk breaking and chipping away at the point where the plaintiff fell, when the coal trucks backed over the curb and put the right rear wheel on the sidewalk, leaving the left rear wheel in the gutter.
Action by Dorothy Prange and husband against Hugh F. McLaughlin. From judgments for plaintiffs, defendant appeals.
Affirmed.
John J. Fallon, of Hoboken, for appellant.
David M. Klausner, of Jersey City, for respondents.
This appeal brings up judgments of the Hudson County Circuit Court in favor of the plaintiffs-respondents in a suit to recover for injuries received by the plaintiff wife and consequential damages of the husband.
The facts are that on January 28, 1932, the female plaintiff was walking along the sidewalk in front of 64 Glenwood avenue, Jersey City, an apartment house owned by the defendant-appellant, and stepped into a hole caused by a break in the cement sidewalk, was thrown into the gutter, and her ankle fractured.
The grounds of appeal are that it was error to refuse the motion to nonsuit and the motion to direct a verdict for the defendant, to which refusals exceptions were taken.
The appellant became the owner of the property in 1925. He had been living in the property, occupying a second story front apartment, for about two years prior to the accident. A son of the appellant testified: "This condition came about by the running over this particular spot and the entire sidewalk, up into the driveway, by coal trucks and occasionally a moving van backing up on the sidewalk."
He further testified, as to the coal trucks: "Well, they just backed along the sidewalk and got as close as possible to the entrance of the apartment, and from there, they were unloaded by carrying bags of coal into the coal chute which was in front of the house." He testified that during the winter of 1930 he saw four or five trucks back on the sidewalk, and in the winter of 1931 at least six or seven. There was no testimony as to the number of moving vans that backed over the curb onto the sidewalk.
This witness, Hugh F. McLaughlin, Jr., also testified that his father was in ill health, that another son of defendant was his agent in charge of this property as well as the other business affairs of the defendant, and that he, the witness, had told his brother of the condition of the sidewalk.
On behalf of the defendant, it was testified by a cement man that it looked to him as if the elements had caused the cracking up and breaking away of the cement pavement.
If this testimony has any probative value, a question of fact as to the cause of the defective condition of the pavement was created.
It is urged on behalf of the appellant that there is no evidence of a nuisance created by the appellant; that if the pavement was broken and the condition created by the use of the sidewalk by coal trucks and moving vans, it was the act of independent contractors, and, under a line of cases, the owner would not be liable for the negligence of such...
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Stewart v. 104 Wallace Street, Inc.
...station owner liable for dangerous condition caused by cars driving over snow on sidewalk to enter gas station); Prange v. McLaughlin, 115 N.J.L. 116, 178 A. 782 (E. & A. 1935) (apartment house owner liable for deterioration caused by coal trucks driving onto sidewalk to deliver coal). An a......
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Chambers v. City and County of Honolulu
...Hughes v. City of New York, Sup., 236 N.Y.S.2d 446; Wylie v. City of New York, 286 App.Div. 720, 146 N.Y.S.2d 207; Prange v. McLaughlin, 115 N.J.L. 116, 178 A. 782. The cases relied on by the appellant where the defect was caused by special use are distinguishable on the facts. Failure to p......
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Davis v. Pecorino
...had either originally created or had thereafter participated in maintaining.' at 180, 145 A.2d at 615. In Prange v. McLaughlin, 115 N.J.L. 116, 178 A. 782 (E. & A. 1935), the plaintiff was injured as a result of stepping into a hole in the sidewalk in front of the defendant's apartment hous......
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Moskowitz v. Herman
...this made the pre-existing condition worse and that this amounted to a public nuisance. Reliance is placed on Prange v. McLaughlin, 115 N.J.L. 116, 178 A. 782 (E. & A.1935). Again the plaintiff cannot surmount her lack of There was testimony that there had been some deliveries of washing ma......