Young v. New York, N.H. & H.R. Co.

• Decision Date: 17 May 1898
• Citation: 50 N.E. 455,171 Mass. 33
• Parties: YOUNG v. NEW YORK, N.H. & H.R. CO.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

171 Mass. 33

50 N.E. 455

YOUNG v. NEW YORK, N.H. & H.R. CO.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

May 17, 1898

COUNSEL

A.A. Strout, R.W. Bartlett, and H.N. Rice, for plaintiff.

Benton & Choate, for defendant.

OPINION

FIELD C.J.

There are four counts in the declaration, some of which are counts at common law, and the others are counts under Pub.St. c 112, § 212, in one of which, at least, it is alleged that the plaintiff's intestate was a passenger. We are of opinion that the evidence does not show that the plaintiff's intestate was in the exercise of due care. He ran across the tracks from the station to the platform, in front of an approaching train, which was in plain sight and which he must have seen. This consideration disposes of all the counts except those brought under Pub.St. c. 112, § 212, in which it is alleged that the plaintiff's intestate was a passenger. Whether there was evidence for the jury that the plaintiff's intestate, at the time he was injured, was a passenger, within the meaning of Pub.St. c. 112, § 212, is a question of more difficulty. The justice presiding at the trial appears to have been of opinion that the decision in Webster v. Railroad Co., 161 Mass. 298, 37 N.E. 165 shows that the plaintiff's intestate was not a passenger at the time he was injured. The question whether a person who intends to take a train, but has not taken it, has become a passenger, has been considered in many cases, but not often with reference to this particular statute. The plaintiff's intestate undoubtedly was a passenger in the sense that he had a right to be at the station, and to cross the walk to the platform on the other side, and the railroad company, we think, owed him the duty which it owed to passengers generally, to provide suitable accommodations and safe and convenient ways of access to the train. While he was at the station he was under that protection which railroad corporations owe to all persons who arrive at a station intending to take a train. Jordan v. Railroad Co., 165 Mass. 346, 43 N.E. 111; Dodge v. Steamship Co., 148 Mass. 207, 19 N.E. 373; Warren v. Railroad Co., 8 Allen, 227. It is plain, we think, that the plaintiff's intestate had presented himself at the proper place,--the place provided by the railroad for passengers,--intending to take a train when it arrived. In this respect the case differs from Webster v. Railroad Co. supra. In McKimble v. Railroad Co., 139 Mass. 542, 2 N.E. 97, and in Merrill v. Railroad Co., 139 Mass 252, 29 N.E. 666, it was held that a passenger continues to be a passenger, within the meaning of Pub.St. c. 112, § 212, while crossing the premises of the railroad company to get upon the street after rightfully leaving a train stopping at a station. The effect of the decision in Warren v. Railroad Co., supra, as applied to the facts stated in the exceptions in the present case, is that if the plaintiff's intestate had a ticket for the passage to Boston he was a passenger while passing from the station across the track to the platform. One object of the statute now incorporated in Pub.St. c. 112, § 212, is said to be the punishment of a railroad company for negligently causing the death of a passenger. Com. v. Boston & L.R. Corp.,...