Santamaria v. Lamport & Holt Line, Ltd.

• Decision Date: 26 January 1938
• Docket Number: No. 38.,38.
• Citation: 196 A. 706
• Parties: SANTAMARIA v. LAMPORT & HOLT LINE, Limited.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

196 A. 706

SANTAMARIA

v. LAMPORT & HOLT LINE, Limited.

No. 38.

Court of Errors and Appeals of New Jersey.

Jan. 26, 1938.

Appeal from Supreme Court

Action for death of plaintiff's husband from falling in the hatchway of a vessel by Maria Santamaria, administratrix ad prosequendum of the estate of John Santamaria, deceased, against Lamport & Holt Line, Limited, a corporation. Judgment for the plaintiff, and defendant appeals.

Affirmed.

Autenrieth & Wortendyke and Reynier J. Wortendyke, Jr., all of Newark, for appellant. Alfred M. Cozzi, of West New York, and Alfred Brenner, of Bayonne, for appellee.

WOLFSKEIL, Judge.

This appeal is from judgment for plaintiff as administratrix ad prosequendum of her decedent husband, who died as a result of injuries sustained from falling into the hatchway of the vessel Biela, while engaged in unloading the consignee's cargo. Defendant's grounds are refusal of the trial judge to grant a nonsuit, and his failure to direct a verdict for defendant.

The record discloses that at the place on the ship where the accident occurred the hatch was removable, consisting of heavy boards, resting on flanges at the sides and beams in the interior. Over these tarpaulins were placed and secured by fastenings. To unload the cargo, both tarpaulins and boards had to be withdrawn for accessibility to the hold. The tarpaulins were removed at the place in question, and decedent, in the course of his work, walked out on one of the boards. When he reached a point at which his weight could not be borne, the board upended, and the part upon which he was standing descended to the hold, into which he dropped, the board falling upon him, so that between the fall and the blow from the board, either or both occasioned the injuries from which he died. Negligence is charged against defendant shipowner in failing to provide and maintain a reasonably safe place within which decedent could work.

Cases cited by defendant to sustain exemption from liability are inapplicable, since a comparison with the instant situation shows a material difference in facts. The result is that defendant's appeal is reduced substantially to challenging the jury's determination of disputed issues.

The company doing the unloading and employing decedent was the consignee of the particular cargo. It was the wish of defendant, and the implied obligation of the consignee, to remove the cargo. The consignee was an invitee, and its employees as consequential invitees shared in the incumbencies due from defendant with respect to providing a reasonably safe place within which to work. Munson Steamship Lines v. Newman, 5 Civ., 24 F.2d 416; Horn v. Hamburg-American Packet Company, 81 N.J.L. 729, 80 A. 490; Grays Harbor Stevedore Co. v. Fountain, 9 Civ., 5 F.2d 385.

Defendant urges the attendant risks were normally incident to decedent's work. This is not an inevitable deduction, nor must an employee accept it as an accompaniment of his labors, that a board upon which he is expected to walk may collapse beneath him when there is nothing in its appearance or in the perceptible circumstances to give apprisal of inherent peril. Latent dangers are not part of the risk a worker assumes. Defendant alleges decedent unnecessarily placed himself in a position from which the accident flowed, proceeded with knowledge of the conditions and was contributorily negligent. The testimony does not necessarily exclude every conclusion except that of voluntary assumption of hazard by decedent. There is evidence from which the jury could elect to decide that the board in question, together with the...