Tyrill v. Alcoa Steamship Company
| Decision Date | 07 February 1958 |
| Parties | Hubert TYRILL, Plaintiff, v. ALCOA STEAMSHIP COMPANY, Inc., Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York |
Morris Hirschhorn, New York City, for plaintiff.
Haight, Gardner, Poor & Havens, New York City, for defendant, Francis X. Byrn, New York City, of counsel.
This is a motion pursuant to § 1404(a) of Title 28 United States Code, to change the venue of this action to the District Court for the District of the Virgin Islands. It appears that the plaintiff is suing for personal injuries sustained in an accident aboard a ship of the defendant which occurred in the Virgin Islands. The plaintiff was a longshoreman. It also appears that the principal witnesses are in the Virgin Islands and that immediately after the accident plaintiff was hospitalized in a hospital in the Virgin Islands. This is the type of situation where ordinarily the convenience of parties and witnesses would require that the venue be changed to the Virgin Islands.
However, plaintiff has submitted facts which would require a different determination. He has established that he is now and has been for some time a patient in the Institute of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Bellevue Medical Center, in New York, New York. The facts show that the plaintiff is a paraplegic. Plaintiff has submitted a copy of an Act of the Legislature of the Virgin Islands showing that this Legislature appropriated $12,000 so that the plaintiff could receive the required maintenance, medical care and rehabilitation in a paraplegic center in continental United States. The resolution of the Legislature of the Virgin Islands certified that there were no facilities for adequate treatment of the case either in the Virgin Islands or the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. The statement of the Associate Director of the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, in which the plaintiff is now a patient, reads in part:
...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Magee v. Essex-Tec Corp.
...require Plaintiff either to drop the case or continue the suit at the risk of endangering his life. See, e.g., Tyrill v. Alcoa Steamship Co., 158 F.Supp. 853, 854 (S.D.N.Y.1958) (motion to transfer case under 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a) that under normal circumstances would justify a transfer was r......
-
Hendricks v. Alcoa Steamship Co.
...61, were called to Judge Dawson's attention when he used the language quoted at page 2 of this brief from Tyrill v. Alcoa Steamship Company, 158 F.Supp. 853, 854 (S.D. N.Y.1958). Russell v. Cunningham, 191 F.Supp. 82 (D.Guam 1961), cited at page 6 of this brief, does not present the situati......
- Tyrill v. Alcoa SS Co.
-
Vassallo v. Niedermeyer
...home district to an alternative forum the Court may consider plaintiff's special medical difficulties. Tyrill v. Alcoa Steamship Co., 158 F.Supp. 853 (S.D.N.Y.1958). Plaintiff's substantial medical problems weigh heavily against Defendants argue that all potential witnesses, other than the ......