Sasnowski v. Mobile & O. R. Co.

• Decision Date: 07 January 1919
• Docket Number: No. 15326.,15326.
• Citation: 207 S.W. 865
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals
• Parties: SASNOWSKI v. MOBILE & O. R. CO.

207 S.W. 865

SASNOWSKI v. MOBILE & O. R. CO.

No. 15326.

St. Louis Court of Appeals. Missouri.

Submitted on Briefs December. 4, 1918.

Opinion Filed January 7, 1919.

Rehearing Denied January 22, 1919.

Appeal from St. Louis Circuit Court; Leo S. Rassieur, Judge.

"Not to be officially published."

Action by Adam Sasnowski against the Mobile & Ohio Railroad Company, a corporation, and others. Judgment far plaintiff against named defendant, and it appeals. Affirmed.

R. P. & B. Williams, of St. Louis, for appellant.

Charles Fensky and Charles E. Morrow, both of St. Louis, for respondent.

REYNOLDS, P. J.

Plaintiff, while assisting in unloading coal from a car, in place on tracks on the premises of the National Enameling & Stamping Company, situated at Granite City, Illinois, had his leg hurt by the falling upon it of the back gate or door of the car, confining him to a hospital and preventing him from earning wages for quite a length of time. The action was originally commenced against the Mobile & Ohio Railroad Company, the St. Louis Merchants Bridge Terminal Railway Company, and the National Enameling & Stamping Company, but was dismissed by plaintiff as to the St. Louis Merchants Bridge Terminal Railway Company and the National Enameling & Stamping Company and went to the jury on the issue as to the liability of the defendant Mobile & Ohio Railroad Company. There was a verdict in favor of plaintiff and against that defendant in, the sum of $1,000, judgment following, from which defendant has duly appealed.

The petition charges that on or about October 6th, 1911, while plaintiff was engaged in the line of his duty as an employé of the Enameling & Stamping Company, in the unloading of coal from a car controlled, used, furnished and operated by the Mobile & Ohio Railroad Company, and which had been run on to the tracks of the Enameling & Stamping Company by the St. Louis Merchants Bridge Terminal Railway Company, and which car was in a defective and dangerous condition known to defendants, a part of the framework at the end of it, sometimes called a door, which was then and there defective and insecurely fastened, the fastenings being loose and broken, came loose and the door fell on plaintiff's left leg, breaking the bone. The negligence charged is that defendant knew, or by the exercise of ordinary care could have known, of the defective condition of the car and the danger to persons working on or about it, in time for plaintiff to have avoided being injured, and that it was the duty of the defendant railroad companies to inspect the car for the purpose of determining whether or not it was in a defective condition, which they had neglected to do, and neglected to give any warning to persons required to work in or about the car, and negligently left the car in this defective condition at the point of its destination loaded with coal to be unloaded, which negligence, it is charged, directly contributed to cause the injury to plaintiff.

The answer of the defendant Mobile & Ohio Railroad Company, after a general denial, pleads that the accident to the plaintiff was caused by his own carelessness and negligence directly contributing to it. This was denied by a reply.

By agreement of counsel, filed in the case, it was stipulated that the Mobile & Ohio Railroad Company was a common carrier, operating a line of railroad in the state of Illinois, and that about October 2nd, 1911, that defendant furnished three coal cars belonging to it, giving the numbers, to the shipper and delivered them to the shipper at its coal mine at Eaton, in Illinois, to be loaded by the shipper with coal; that after the cars were loaded by the shipper with coal, the defendant railroad, on that date, moved the car over its railroad line from Eaton, billed to the National Enameling & Stamping Company, at Granite City, Illinois, and delivered the cars, on October 4th, 1911, to a connecting carrier at East St. Louis, the northern end of the line of the Mobile & Ohio Railroad Company; that this connecting carrier thereafter and on October 6th, 1911, delivered the loaded cars to the National Enameling & Stamping Company on its private track at Granite City, Illinois.

Plaintiff then proceeded to the introduction of oral testimony, which was taken by means of interpreters and, as usual in cases of that kind, is very unsatisfactory. It sufficiently appears, however, that at the time of the accident, there were a few bushels of coal in the rear end of a car in place on the private tracks of the Enameling & Stamping Company, which plaintiff, with others was unloading. This coal was at the rear end' of the car, which seems to have been composed of a gate or door, to be opened inward. The car was identified as a car of the Mobile & Ohio Railroad Company. There was evidence to the effect that this door was not securely fastened; that it was intended to have staples in the frame of the car. There is testimony that the wood work into which the staples were driven was old and rotten, so rotten that a witness testified that taking hold of this wood work he could crumble it with his fingers. Some...