Randall v. New York, N.H.&H.R. Co.

• Decision Date: 01 March 1917
• Citation: 226 Mass. 404,115 N.E. 231
• Parties: RANDALL v. NEW YORK, N. H. & H. R. CO.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

226 Mass. 404

115 N.E. 231

RANDALL

v.NEW YORK, N. H. & H. R. CO.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Dukes County.

March 1, 1917.

Report from Superior Court, Dukes County; Frederick H. Chase, Judge.

Action by Lulu D. Randall against the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad Company. Verdict for defendant, and case reported. Judgment ordered for plaintiff.

The jury found in answer to questions submitted that defendant did not exercise reasonable care to protect plaintiff's property, and also that plaintiff's loss was $1,200.

Wm. A. Morse, of Boston, for plaintiff.

Arthur J. Young and Stuart C. Rand, both of Boston, for defendant.

LORING, J.

On a warm night in summer the plaintiff was a passenger on the defendant's midnight train from New York to Boston, occupying a lower berth. She boarded the train at about 10 o'clock and immediately went to bed. When she went to bed she took off six rings and put them with some other articles of value together and with a letter of instructions from her husband in a traveling bag and put the traveling bag under her pillow. This bag was made of silk, was about 8 inches long, 5 inches ‘across the bottom’ and about 12 inches high. It was ‘a very soft bag that could be closed up.’ She went to sleep and awoke some two hours or more later when the train was thirty to forty-five minutes out of New York. She thought of something which led her to wish to reread her husband's letter of instructions. On reaching for her bag she found that it was gone. There was but one window beside her berth. When she went on board the car this window was open at the bottom and the part that was open was covered by a wire screen and this screen was in place when she went to sleep. When she work up it was found that the screen had been cut and the wire setting of the screen had been rolled up so as to leave quite open the whole space within the frame of the screen. There was some conflict in the evidence as to whether the screen consisted of one or two panels and a finding on that point could have been made either way. But whether the screen had one or two panels the evidence was clear that all the wire of the screen between the frame or frames had been rolled up so that the whole of the space within the frame or frames was open and unprotected. The New York station of the defendant at that time was a temporary one used by it while the new Grand Central Station was being built. When the plaintiff boarded the midnight train it was on a track next to the 11 o'clock train and that train was on a track next the outer wall of the station. Between the two trains was a small wall 2 1/2 feet wide describedby one of the witnesses as ‘a temporary box-work wall.’ The plaintiff's berth was on the side of the train next to this wall. From the head end of the screen to the head end of the berth was 4 feet. When the 11 o'clock train drew out ‘it left a long dark passage-way which might easily be a place where a man could work and no one see what he did because they [meaning the defendant railroad] did not have sufficient watchmen.’ ‘After the 11 o'clock train went out the lights were taken away.’ These are the facts which the jury were warranted in finding were the facts of the case.

The judge left the following questions to the jury: ‘1. Did the defendant exercise reasonable care to protect the plaintiff's property?’ The jury answered this question ‘No.’ ‘2. What was the amount of the plaintiff's loss and damage?’ The jury answered this question ‘$1,200.00.’ Thereupon the judge directed the jury to return a general verdict for the defendant and reported the case to this court. It is stated in the report that the judge submitted the special questions set forth above ‘under the third count.’

[1][2] 1. The defendant contends and the plaintiff concedes that to recover the burden was on her to prove that the loss she sustained was caused by negligence on the part of the defendant. And of that there can be no question. Kinsley v. Lake Shore & Michigan Southern R. R., 125 Mass. 54, 28 Am. Rep. 200;Whitney v. Pullman Palace Car Co., 143 Mass. 243, 9 N. E. 619;Lewis v. New York Sleeping Car Co., 143 Mass. 267, 9 N. E. 615,58 Am. Rep. 135;Dawley v. Wagner Palace Car Co., 169 Mass. 315, 47 N. E. 1024;Whicher v. B. & A. R. R., 176 Mass. 275, 57 N. E. 601,79 Am. St. Rep. 314. The cases in this commonwealth and in some other jurisdictions are collected in the last of these five cases. We are of opinion that the jury were warranted in answering the first question as they did that is to say in finding that the defendant was negligent.

2. The defendant has contended that although the jury could and did find that it was negligent there was no evidence in the case of the particular...