Valentine v. Middlesex R. Co.
| Citation | 137 Mass. 28 |
| Parties | James M. Valentine v. Middlesex Railroad Company |
| Decision Date | 04 March 1884 |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Suffolk. Tort for personal injuries occasioned to the plaintiff, while a passenger in one of the defendant's open street cars by being thrown out of the car. At the trial in the Superior Court, before Blodgett, J., the jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff; and the defendant alleged exceptions, which appear in the opinion.
Exceptions overruled.
L. M Child, for the defendant.
D. E Ware, for the plaintiff.
The Superior Court could not properly rule, as requested by the defendant, tat there was no evidence of negligence to go to the jury. There was direct evidence that the defendant was using its track when it was not in a safe condition to be used. It appeared that the defendant was repairing its track at the place where the accident to the plaintiff happened. For this purpose, it had removed the paving-stones in the street, and, at the time of the accident, some of them had not been replaced. There was evidence tending to show that the absence of the paving-stones made the passage at this point dangerous; and that this caused the injury to the plaintiff. This evidence was for the consideration of the jury, and was properly submitted to them.
The defendant's exception to the admission of the deposition of Dr. Field cannot be sustained. It appears that, when the interrogatories were filed in court for the taking of this deposition, several interrogatories had been objected to by the defendant by writing under them respectively the words "Objected to by the defendant." In reading the deposition to the jury, the plaintiff's counsel omitted to read these words. The defendant's counsel was present, and made no objection to the answers being read; but, at the close of the reading, he called the attention of the court to the fact that these words had been omitted, and contended, as a right, that the deposition should therefore be excluded. He had no such right. If he intended to insist upon his objections, it was his duty, in the exercise of proper diligence, to make his objections when the interrogatories were read. If, as he contends, the plaintiff's counsel was bound, in the proper conduct of the trial, to read the objections to the interrogatories, his omission to do so did not render the deposition incompetent as evidence....
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