Skelly v. Pleasure Beach Park Corp.

• Court: Supreme Court of Connecticut
• Writing for the Court: HINMAN, J.
• Citation: 115 Conn. 92,160 A. 309
• Parties: SKELLY v. PLEASURE BEACH PARK CORPORATION.
• Decision Date: 10 May 1932

160 A. 309

115 Conn. 92

SKELLY
v.
PLEASURE BEACH PARK CORPORATION.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

May 10, 1932

Appeal from Court of Common Pleas, New Haven County; Harry J. Beardsley, Judge.

Action by Lawrence Skelly against the Pleasure Beach Park Corporation to recover damages alleged to have been caused by the negligence of the defendant, brought to the court of common pleas and tried to the jury. Verdict and judgment for the plaintiff, and appeal by the defendant. No error. [160 A. 310]

[115 Conn. 93] J. Warren Upson, of Waterbury, for appellant.

John E. Whalen and Herman B. Engelman, both of Waterbury, for appellee.

Argued before MALTBIE, C.J., and HINMAN, HAINES, BANKS, and AVERY, JJ.

HINMAN, J.

The defendant corporation owned and operated an amusement park abutting on Long Island Sound, including bathhouses and a place for swimming and bathing in the waters of the Sound. A part of the beach, approximately four hundred feet in length, situated in front of the bathhouses, was inclosed by wire fences extending from the bathhouses to and below low-water mark, and this area was reserved for the use of the defendant's patrons who paid the required admission charge. The defendant located and maintained in the water opposite this inclosure two floats, and midway between these, but about seventy-five feet further from shore, a stationary diving tower. Both floats were moored to the shore by lines running to posts, and on the farther side of the westerly float a line about fifteen feet in length ran to an anchor of steel two feet wide and four feet long embedded in the sand, and on the farther side of the easterly float a similar line ran to a cement block about two feet square, sunk in the sand. The defendant caused the floats and anchors to be inspected weekly, and about seven days prior to July 22, 1930, the anchors of both floats were found to be below the surface of the bottom, but in the interim a storm causing the water to become very rough had occurred.

On the afternoon of July 22d, the plaintiff purchased an admission ticket, entered the inclosed area, and eventually walked from the beach into the water, and had passed one of the floats five or ten feet when he struck the calf of his right leg against a submerged object, and sustained a wound which caused him [115 Conn. 94] considerable suffering, expense, and disability. Immediately after his injury he examined the object which had inflicted it by feeling under the surface of the water, and testified that it felt like rough cement about two feet square at the top.

The facts above stated were substantially undisputed, and it is not claimed that the jury could not reasonably have found them. The main reliance of the appellant as to the motion to set aside the verdict is upon a contention that, principally on account of the effect of the granting of motions to strike out, evidential support is lacking for a further fact, essential to recovery, that the object by which the plaintiff's leg was wounded was the concrete block used as an anchor for one of the floats, as the plaintiff claimed. Testimony given by the plaintiff indicated that the float toward and past which he walked through the water was the right-hand or westerly float, and that the object which injured him and which he described was near that float. It developed later that the anchor of this float was of steel and of different shape and size from the concrete block which was used as anchor for the easterly float. Thereupon counsel for the defendant moved that the...