Shaughnessy v. Boston & M.R.R.

• Decision Date: 07 January 1916
• Parties: SHAUGHNESSY v. BOSTON & M. R. R. (two cases).
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

222 Mass. 334

110 N.E. 962

SHAUGHNESSY

v.BOSTON & M. R. R. (two cases).

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Middlesex.

Jan. 7, 1916.

Exceptions from Superior Court, Middlesex County; Wm. B. Stevens, Judge.

Actions by Ethel B. Shaughnessy, by next friend, and by Thomas F. Shaughnessy against the Boston & Maine Railroad. Judgment for defendant in each case, and plaintiff in each case excepts. Exceptions overruled in each case.

Whipple, Sears & Ogden and Edward O. Proctor, all of Boston, for plaintiffs.

Trull & Wier and John M. O'Donoghue, all of Lowell, for defendant.

RUGG, C. J.

The plaintiff, Ethel B. Shaughnessy, was a passenger upon a steam train of the defendant. As the train approached the station of her destination, but while it was several hundred feet away, she rose from her seat within a car and went through the door to the platform, following in this respect the conduct of other passengers and especially that of a neighbor, who opened the door of the car and jammed it hard against the catch on the floor, trying three or four times before it caught. She stood on the platform of the car with her hand on the door jamb to steady herself, the train being still in motion. At the instant of its coming to a stop in the usual manner, with no violent jolt or jar, the door swung against her fingers and she received injuries, to recover damages for which these actions are brought.

It was said of one traveling on a steam railroad in Hickey v. Boston & Lowell Railroad, 14 Allen, 429, 432:

‘A passenger is not justified in incurring risks unnecessarily, however, rare the chances may be that he will suffer by it. * * * If, then, the position upon the platform was taken voluntarily, and without reasonable cause of necessity or propriety,’ there is no exercise of due care.

This statement of the law in substance has been approved and reaffirmed in Fletcher v. Boston & Maine Railroad, 187 Mass. 463, 465, 73 N. E. 552,105 Am. St. Rep. 414,Files v. Boston & Albany Railroad, 149 Mass. 204, 206, 21 N. E. 311,14 Am. St. Rep. 411,Torrey v. Boston & Albany Railroad, 147 Mass. 412, 413, 18 N. E. 213,Renaud v. N. Y., N. H. & H. R. R. CO., 210 Mass. 553-555, 97 N. E. 98,38 L. R. A. (N. S.) 689, and Bromley v. N. Y., N. H. & H. R. R., 193 Mass. 453, 79 N. E. 775. It thus is extremely doubtful if the plaintiff was in the exercise of due care.

There was no evidence of negligence on the part of the defendant. The car door was opened by a passenger and not by...