Slack v. Harris

• Decision Date: 16 December 1902
• Citation: 200 Ill. 96,65 N.E. 669
• Parties: SLACK v. HARRIS.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

200 Ill. 96

65 N.E. 669

SLACK

v.HARRIS.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Dec. 16, 1902.

Appeal from appellate court, First district.

Action by Abraham L. Harris against Charles H. Slack. From a judgment of the appellate court (101 Ill. App. 527) affirming a judgment in favor of plaintiff, defendant appeals. Affirmed.Americus B. Meiville, for appellant.

Francis J. Woolley, for appellee.

This is an action on the case, brought by the appellee against the appellant to recover damages for injuries suffered by appellee, while engaged, as an employé of appellant, in operating a passenger elevator in a building on Randolph street, in Chicago, of which appellant was lessee, and in which building appellant conducted his business. The plea of general issue was filed. The trial resulted in verdict and judgment in favor of appellee for the sum of $2,250. An appeal was taken to the appellate court, where the judgment has been affirmed. The present appeal is prosecuted from such judgment of affirmance.

The appellee was employed by the appellant to run the elevator up and down in the building, in which there were six floors or stories, for the purpose of carrying passengers. There was also in the service or employment of appellant an engineer by the name of George H. Neff, whose business it was, as engineer, to run the engine for the purpose of supplying the power for running and operating the elevator. The elevator was run by electricity. The electric machinery was on the roof, and, as one of the witnesses says, ‘with a little house built up there sheltering it, about four feet from a shaft where the elevator run up,-four feet to one side. You get up to this room, where the electric machinery was, by getting off at the sixth floor, and going around to a little pair of steps, and go up into the machinery room.’ The evidence of the appellee tended to show that the elevator car did not stop even with the floor on the first or bottom story, and on the sixth or top story. The accident occurred on the 9th day of September, 1897, in the middle of the day. The evidence of the appellee tended to show that at that time the engineer went up in the elevator to the room where the electric machinery was, on the roof, for the purpose of trying to remedy or correct the failure of the elevator car to stop even with the floor, and also a slight jar with which the elevator car would stop, when the lever, used for the purpose of moving the same, was thrown to the center; that the brake took hold a little too hard, making it uncomfortable for passengers; that, when the engineer went up to the machinery room, he took with him a monkey wrench; that, after the engineer went up to the sixth floor, and into the motor room, he called to the appellee, and told him to run the car up and down, and stop at each floor, which appellee did; that the elevator car, after thus being moved up and down by appellee, failed to stop even with the floors; that appellee then went up to the sixth floor, to report to the engineer that the elevator lacked a foot and a half of coming to the main floor, and was told by him, ‘Go ahead and run it down, and stop at each floor, and see how near it will come to stop at each floor;’ that, while appellee was so engaged in running the elevator up and down, the car began to rise rapidly, so that appellee was unable to control it, and finally it struck the roof, and appellee was precipitated out of the elevator some seven feet to the floor of the top story, and received the injuries for which the present suit is brought. The evidence of the appellee also tends to show that while the engineer was in the motor room he was working with the machinery by screwing and unscrewing certain nuts upon the machinery with a view of tightening and loosening the brake; and that the effect of this manipulation of the machinery by the engineer was the cause of the loosening of the brake and of the inability of the appellee so to manage the lever as to control the elevator car. The evidence of the appellee also tends to show that on the morning when the accident occurred the appellant told appellee that he was subject to the orders of the engineer, and must do as the engineer told him. Indeed, the evidence of the appellee tends to show that appellant had reproved him for not obeying the engineer, and had said to him: ‘You do as the engineer says, or else I don't want you. You are under him.’ The evidence of the appellant tended to show that the engineer did not touch the machinery or appliances in the motor room, except to oil them, and that he had no monkey wrench, and gave no orders to appellee to run the elevator up and down the shaft while he was engaged in oiling it.

The declaration consists of three counts. The first count charged that the engineer, whose duty it was to oversee the electric machinery, and manage the same, and see that the elevator was in a reasonably safe conditionto be controlled by appellee as the operator thereof, was an unskillful, ignorant, and incompetent person. But during the course of the trial, the first count of the declaration was withdrawn or dismissed. The second count, which averred that the elevator was run by electric power and machinery located on the top of the building, intended to be controlled by means of a lever operated by the elevator man from inside of the elevator, charged that appellant carelessly and negligently failed to use reasonable care to have the elevator in reasonably safe condition for appellee to control the same, but, on the contrary, permitted it to be in such defective condition that it was not controllable by the lever, although, by the use of due diligence, appellant could easily have known of the defective condition of the elevator, and could easily have remedied the defects before plaintiff was injured. The third count averred and charged that appellant ‘had also then and there in his employ a certain engineer, whose duty it was to take change of the electric machinery, which ran the said elevator, which machinery was situated near the top of the shaft in which said elevator ran; and the plaintiff, in the course of his said employment, was then and there subject to the orders of the said engineer, and under obligations to obey the directions of the said engineer. And the defendant, by the said engineer, and by divers other servants in that behalf, then and there attempted to make certain changes and alterations in the electric machinery of the said elevator, and in so doing loosened and altered the position of divers nuts, bolts, and screws upon the said machinery, and disconnected divers switches, keys, wires, and brushes upon the said machinery, and removed from their position divers brakes, controllers, automatic stops, connections, ropes, cables, wheels, drums, and appliances upon the said machinery, so that, by reason of the condition of said machinery, so produced, it was dangerous for any person to be upon the said car of the said elevator, or to attempt to operate the same by means of the said lever upon the said elevator; of all of which the defendant, by due care and diligence, would have been aware, but of which the plaintiff was then and there ignorant. Whereupon it became and was the duty of the defendant not to place the plaintiff upon the said elevator, or order him to operate the lever upon the said elevator, while the said machinery was in the said dangerous condition. Yet, nevertheless, the defendant, by his certain servants in that behalf, who were not fellow servants of the plaintiff, then and there, while said machinery was in the said dangerous condition, carelessly and negligently ordered and directed the plaintiff to be upon the said elevator, and to operate the same by means of the said lever; whereby, while the plaintiff was with all due care and diligence upon the said elevator, and attempting to operate and control the same by means of the said lever, in obedience to the said orders of the defendant, the said elevator, by reason of the dangerous condition of the said machinery hereinbefore set forth, became uncontrollable, so that the plaintiff could not control the same by means of the said lever; and thereby the said elevator rose with great rapidity, and struck with great force and violence against the upper part of the works of the said elevator machinery; and thereby the plaintiff was thrown out of the said elevator with great force and violence to the floor of the said that the plaintiff and the engineer, at hurt,’ etc.

MAGRUDER, C. J. (after stating the facts).

1. It is claimed on the part of the appellant that the trial court erred in refusing to give to the jury, at the close of appellee's evidence, and again at the close of all the testimony, a written instruction to find appellant not guilty. Whether or not it was erroneous to refuse this instruction depends upon the question whether the evidence tended to support the cause of action. There was evidence tending to show that the appellant was guilty of such negligence as caused the injury to appellee. The engineer, Neff, stood to the appellant in the relation of a vice principal to a principal, and was clothed by appellant with authority to give orders to the appellee, and direct him in his control of the elevator car. The evidence introduced by the appellee tended to show that there was some defect in the working of the elevator car, which caused it to stop either too far above or too far below some of the floors, and to produce a jar at the time of so stopping. Appellee's evidence also tended to show that the engineer went up to the motor room on the roof for the purpose of attempting to remedy the defect, and in doing so so loosened some of the nuts or bolts upon the machinery as to make it impossible for appellee, when operating the elevator car, to control the lever. This loosening of the brake is alleged to have caused the injuries in question. It appears that these nuts...