Root v. Henry
| Decision Date | 21 September 1965 |
| Docket Number | No. 31835,31835 |
| Citation | 395 S.W.2d 280 |
| Parties | Mary ROOT, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Bessie HENRY, Defendant-Respondent. |
| Court | Missouri Court of Appeals |
Morris A. Shenker and Frank B. Green, Jr., St. Louis, for plaintiff-appellant.
Don B. Sommers, Gray & Sommers, St. Louis, for defendant-respondent.
This is an action against a defendant landlord by Mary Root for damages arising out of an injury she sustained when she slipped and fell while entering a rooming house where she lived. There was a verdict in favor of the plaintiff in the sum of $8,000. The defendant filed a motion for judgment in accordance with her motion for a directed verdict filed at the close of the evidence. The court sustained this motion and entered a judgment for the defendant. The plaintiff prosecutes this appeal.
It is of course here contended that the plaintiff made a case properly submissible to the jury and that the court erred in entering a judgment for the defendant.
The facts are that the plaintiff, who was 60 years of age, was employed in a laundry which was five blocks from the place where she lived. On December 1, while at work, she noticed from the window, at about two or two-thirty, that it was raining and freezing. This continued and it was still raining and freezing as she quit work at four-thirty. When she left work she crossed the street and bought a loaf of bread and then walked the five blocks to her home. She did not arrive there until about five fifteen. It took her forty-five minutes to buy the bread and walk from the laundry because the sidewalks were very slippery and slick. It was still misting rain and freezing as it fell.
The place where the plaintiff lived was owned by the defendant. It was a rooming house and the plaintiff occupied two rooms on the second floor. The front of the main part of the house was about twenty-five feet from the public sidewalk. There was a one story building in front of the main house and attached to it. This contained a confectionery which the defendant operated. It extended out to the front sidewalk. Flanking the east wall of the confectionery there were four steps leading up to a walk. This walk, also adjacent to the east wall of the confectionery, led to steps that went up to the front door of the main building.
The plaintiff testified that as she reached the sidewalk in front of the house she could see that salt had been spread upon it and on the steps that went up to the walk leading to the door. She could see this by reason of the street light but it was quite dark at the time and as she reached the walk leading to the steps that went up to the front door and she could not see the walk. She said that she could feel salt on the walk with her feet but that it was still raining and that the rain had frozen over the salt and it was slick.
Carrying a loaf of bread in one hand and her handbag in the other she went up the walk to the steps by the front door. She placed her left foot on the first step and as she did so and put her weight upon it she slipped and fell. She said she did not feel any salt with her foot as she placed it on the step where she slipped. Her fall caused her to break her ankle but the evidence relating to her injury need not be set out as no point is raised in relation to it. She also stated that the defendant told her after the accident that she had not finished the job of salting because she had run out of salt.
The defendant's testimony was that she had spread salt on the front walk, both sets of steps, and the walk between them at about two-thirty in the afternoon when the freezing started. She denied that she had told the plaintiff that she had not finished the job of salting. She also said that her other tenants had entered the main house through the confectionery, which had a rear door connecting with the hall of the main house.
As stated, there was a verdict and judgment for the plaintiff. The defendant filed a motion to set aside the judgment and to enter a judgment in favor of the defendant, or in the alternative, to grant a new trial. The court sustained the motion and set aside the judgment and entered a judgment for the defendant in accordance with defendant's previous motion for a directed verdict and in the alternative granted a new trial should its order entering a judgment for the defendant be held erroneous upon appeal.
In support of her contention that the court erred in entering a judgment for the defendant the plaintiff makes the following assertion:
'On the issue of negligence, plaintiff adduced substantial evidence that the defendant knew, or in the exercise of ordinary care could have foreseen that the incomplete job of spreading salt on the exterior steps created, after dark, a deceptive appearance, to one in the exercise of ordinary care for his own safety, that all of the steps were coated with salt; that by reason thereof plaintiff was caused to...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Maschoff v. Koedding
...Massachusetts rule, and that result has been adhered to in subsequent cases, all of which have been decided by this court. Root v. Henry, Mo.App., 395 S.W.2d 280; Loyd v. Levin, Mo.App., 413 S.W.2d 540; Johnson v. Murphy, Mo.App., 417 S.W.2d 527. None of those cases involved a state of fact......
-
Hulahan v. Sheehan
...they cite Woodley v. Bush, 272 S.W.2d 833 (Mo.App.1954), Krause v. Laverne Park Ass'n., 240 S.W.2d 724 (Mo.App.1951) and Root v. Henry, 395 S.W.2d 280 (Mo.App.1965). Plaintiff takes the position that the defendants have misconstrued his theory of the case, that he has no quarrel with cases ......
-
Johnson v. Murphy
...in Everett v. Wallbrun was wrong and urges us to reexamine it. We reviewed the underlying principle in the recent cases of Root v. Henry, Mo.App., 395 S.W.2d 280 and Loyd v. Levin, Mo.App., 413 S.W.2d 540 and find no reason to change our The judgment is affirmed. PER CURIAM: The foregoing o......