Maginnis v. Missouri Pacific Railway Co.
Maginnis v. Missouri Pacific Railway Co.
Opinion of the Court
This is the second appearance of this case before us on appeal from the action of the trial court in sustaining a motion for new trial and setting aside the verdict which had been rendered by the jury, in each case a verdict for $2000 in favor of plaintiff. On the former appeal we held that the action of the trial court in granting a new trial should be affirmed, but we remanded the cause for further proceedings on, the ground that if a recovery is to be had at all “it must be sustained only on the last chance
The two witnesses as to the main facts connected with the movements of the decedent at the time of the accident, who testified at the former trial, again testified at this second trial, namely, Mr. Evers, the proprietor- of the store referred to in the opinion, which was located on the west side of the Berry road and to the south of the railroad crossing, and the engineer of the train, Mr. Hayes, the latter the only eyewitness' to the accident, who at this last trial was called and put upon the stand by plaintiff.
There was some evidence for the defendant, introduced at this second trial, after it had interposed a demurrer to the evidence, which does not appear to have been introduced at the former trial. It was given by a gentleman who was a passenger on the train. This witness on this second trial testified that on the morning of the accident he was sitting in the smoking car when he heard the whistle blowing, first, apparently, the ordinary crossing whistle, then in a little while short and quick and many blasts. He put his head out of the window, thinking that the train was about to run over something and saw a man going, as it appeared to him, at a right angle, to cross the, track ahead of the train. It seemed to him that the man was quite a little bit in front of the engine but the witness could not tell whether he was in danger or not and it looked to him like he was trying to cross at right angles and
On cross-examination this witnéss testified that the quick, short whistle he heard was what he considered, not being a railroad man or an expert, an alarm whistle, of such a character as to indicate to him that there was something on the track. That was what attracted his attention and caused him to look out; could not tell where the train was when he first heard the whistle; had heard the whistle before he looked out; may have heard it eighty rods before he got to the crossing, but as he was a stranger, not acquainted with the locality, did not know that the alarm whistle, as he called it, was what caused him to look out, the whistle preceding that not having attracted his attention, as we understand his testimony. This testimony supports the conclusion reached by our court that there was nothing-lacking in the way of signals or of actionable negligence on the part of the engineer, in so far as that feature of the case is concerned, and in a way supports the testimony of the engineer.
Eeferring to the testimony of the witness Evers, proprietor of the store, as set out very fully in the former opinion, it is to be noted that he testified that he had traced the course of the decedent by footprints, identifying these footprints as those of the decedent by cracks in. the soles of his shoes. That is, he found cracks in the footprints corresponding to those in the shoes. So he testified at this last trial, testifying that after the train had left, he, with several others, went out and followed these footprints. It had been rain
On cross-examination, this witness testified that he saw ahont three prints of each foot. Asked if at the time when he looked ont there in the mud for these tracks, he had looked anywhere else for tracks except alongside the rail and between the rails, the witness answered: “A. We couldn’t follow him on the plank walk or in the cinders distinct,” repeating that they could not follow him on all of the plank walk, only where the cinders had mud on them. This examination was made after the train had proceeded to St. Louis and after several people had crossed back and forth over the boards and crossing. No comparison of the footprints with the shoes of decedent was made other than that Evers testified that he saw that the soles of the shoes had a crack in them and that he found a crack in these tracks or imprints.
As the testimony of the engineer is not given in full in the opinion formerly rendered, we think it well to set it out at some length. Called and testifying on behalf of plaintiff: at this last trial, the engineer, Hayes, stated that he was the engineer in charge of the engine which struck and killed Mr. Maginnis on the date named. He had taken charge of the train as engineer at Jefferson City and was running it into St. Louis. At the time of the accident the train was going at about forty or fifty miles an hour, as he guessed. (The train running from west to east, the Evers store south of the railroad tracks and on the west side of the Berry road, one directly in front of the store would not be within the view of the engineer as he drove east until he had cleared the store.) When he first saw Mr. Maginnis as his train approached Berry road crossing that morning, Mr. Maginnis was just emerging from behind Mr. Evers’ store; had just come out from behind that store.
Cross-examining him on part of defendant, counsel asked witness this: “Now, when you saw Mr. Maginnis coming out from the end of the board walk, you say he started as though he were going to the station?” "Witness answered, “When he left the board walk; he wasn’t to the end of the board walk.” Counsel repeated, “He came to the end of the board walk and he was coming north until he came to the end of the board walk?” To which witness answered, “He never came to the end of the board walk.” (Here it is to be noted that it is stated in our former opinion (l. c. 710), that it appears that Maginnis followed the sidewalk to the end of it, twenty-one feet south of the south rail and then turned to the northeast. This, it will be seen is flatly contradicted by the engineer at this trial, a very important difference.) When he was coming down toward the track he was coming north; when he went off of the board walk and started to
On redirect examination by counsel for plaintiff the witness was asked what opportunity he had to give a crossing signal after Mr. Maginnis made this sudden turn toward the track and before he got on the track, witness answered, “I never made a crossing-signal when he made — I started to make a crossing-signal only once before he diverted his course directly
It is contended that the testimony of Mr. Evers, the storekeeper, and of Mr. Hayes, the engineer, is contradictory and irreconcilable and that this made the case turn on the question of fact and hence subject to the action of the jury. We are unable to concur in this view of the testimony. In the first place Mr. Evers does not testify that the decedent continued along the plank walk in front of his store to the end of that walk. Mr. Evers does not pretend to say at what point any footprints showed that the decedent left that walk nor the direction which he had taken after he left that sidewalk. The testimony of the engineer is positive that he did not go to the end of that w;alk but that after taking two or three steps from behind Evers’ store the decedent had started' in a diagonal direction toward the station which is on the same side of the railroad tracks as is Evers’ store, east of that store and south of the tracks. Evers testifies that he found these tracks commencing toward the west end of the sixteen-foot planks at the crossing. He found three of them going toward the northeast corner of the crossing and it was at the northeast corner of these planks or crossing that Maginnis was hit and killed. When he was taking these two or three steps on these planks inside of the rails, it was after he had changed his course and as
As here applicable we may well quote what our Supreme Court has said in Rollison v. Wabash R. R. Co., 252 Mo. 525, l. c. 539, 160 S. W. 994: “Was there any substantial evidence from other witnesses that the sole eyewitness on the ground, who saw all and whose act is to be judged, was mistaken in fact when he said he acted as quickly as he could after he saw decedent arise and start to his death?” We think there was not.
On all the other propositions involved, the evidence here is practically as before and our conclusion on it is as before; that is, that plaintiff made out no case.
In short, we do not consider that the positive, affirmative testimony of the engineer, the only eyewitness to the accident, can be said to be contradicted by or inconsistent with that of Mr. Evers as to foot
This whole accident was one of seconds: a very few seconds, at most.
In Underwood v. St. Louis, I. Mt. & S. Ry. Co., 182 Mo. App. 252, 168 S. W. 803, commenting on the difference in the testimony as to' the position of the horse and buggy, between that of the engineer and witnesses for plaintiff, the Springfield Court of Appeals has said (l. c. 273): “But why speculate as to one or two seconds in time and five to ten feet in the distance of the horse from the track? Liability cannot be predicated on so narrow a margin. The burden is on the plaintiff to prove the facts which bring the case within the rule now invoked. Engineers are human beings and we cannot exact of them to act instantly and in the most intelligent way in cases of emergency. Liability does not arise from mere errors of judgment or failure to act instantly in such cases. Every one knows that the'very necessity for instant action delays the same and emergencies demanding quick and intelligent action breed confusion and delay. An act which ordinarily would be performed in a second, if limited to that in order to save life often paralyzes the efforts- to do so. The engineer’s duties under such circumstances are complex, he must think and that takes time.”
So in McGee v. Wabash R. R. Co., 214 Mo. 530, 114 S. W. 33, referring to the train running 400 feet in five and one-half seconds, and the duty of the fireman, as it was claimed-, to have seen the peril of decedent and to have warned the engineer in time to have avoided the accident, our Supreme Court has said (l. c. 543): “How are those mere pulse beats to be distributed between the engineer and fireman in meting out praise and blame and arriving at actionable negligence? . . . Courts being eminently practical tribunals in getting at practical and just results in
As has been truly observed in these and many cases, engineers are hut human beings. They, as well as the wayfarer upon the tracks, are entitled to he judged by the laws governing humqn actions. When as here appears, this unfortunate engineer of this train, did all that was possible to avoid the accident when he saw its imminence, shall we hold him responsible — ■ morally, if not pecuniarily — for the death of the decedent? He is human, and we can well believe that the vision of this fatality long lingered with him as a haunting memory, for no one can but deeply feel a death which, however unwittingly, fell in at his hands. Hence we refer to this engineer as unfortunate. A locomotive engineer is charged with great responsibility, not only for the safety of property, hut what is of far greater moment, the safety in life and limb of a multitude of human beings. His calling requires constant watchfulness, extraordinary care and these the law requires of him. While in the course of his duty he is often required to act on the instant, the law does not hold him guilty, if in that instant he errs. He is only required to do the very best 'he can under the surroundings as he sees them.
Shall we judge his act by that act as it looks to us in our calm review of its attendant circumstances, and looking hack at it, say that it was a negligent act because we can now say, in the light of those circumstances as they appear to us, it could have been avoided? That is not the law. The act of the engineer is to he judged, not from the circumstances as the jury sees them,hut from how they must have appeared to him at the time — he looking at them as a reasonable man. It is true that if damages are here allowed, they will
As has been said by our Supreme Court in McGee v. Wabash Railroad Co., supra, (l. c. 543) “to get to the jury, plaintiffs must get their case out of the fog of conjecture and plant it on a basis of fact.” This the plaintiff failed to do on the issue now on hand. As against the positive testimony of the engineer, who was the plaintiff’s own witness, and barring the passenger on the train, the only eyewitness to the immediate event, we have nothing but conjectures raised by the testimony of Mr. Evers. A verdict cannot rest on this mere conjecture.
Our conclusion is that this case falls within what has been determined by our Supreme Court in Guyer v. Missouri Pacific Ry. Co., 174 Mo. 344, 73 S. W. 584; Mockowik v. Kansas City, St. J. & Council Bluffs R. R. Co., 196 Mo. 550, 94 S. W. 256; King v. Wabash R. R. Co., 211 Mo. 1, 109 S. W. 671; Burge v. Wabash R. R. Co., 244 Mo. 76, 148 S. W. 925, and cases hereinbefore cited, in that it clearly appears that the decedent moved from a place of safety into a place of danger so quickly that the engineer, not seeing him change from that place of safety into one of danger until too late to avoid the accident, neither he nor this defendant can be held liable.
The action of the trial court in overruling the demurrer to the evidence was wrong, "and its action in setting aside the verdict and granting a new trial for that error is correct and is affirmed. The cause is accordingly remanded to that court for such further proceedings as are in accordance with this opinion. Allen, J., concurs. Nortoni, J., dissents and deeming it in conflict with the opinion of the Supreme Court in
Dissenting Opinion
DISSENTING OPINION.
I dissent from the opinion of the court-in this case for the reason that it seems to me to ignore material facts in the record; and also that sound principles of law are not adhered to in dealing with the facts as stated. As I understand the facts in proof, there is sufficient to send the issue to the jury as to whether or not defendant’s engineer might have given decedent a warning of the approach of the train in sufficient time to enable him to save himself, though the train could not be stopped. Of course, it is conceded the train could not have been stopped in time to have saved plaintiff’s husband but under the authority of Eppstein v. Railroad, 197 Mo. 720, 94 S. W. 967, the duty devolved upon defendant to exercise ordinary care for the safety of one seen in a position of danger, and if it could not stop the train, such duty at least called for the sounding of alarms in due time to enable the decedent to make an effort to get out of the way if possible and thus save himself from injury.
The train was approaching a public crossing where the duty rested with defendant to look out for pedestrians. According to the testimony of the engineer, Maginnis was seen while on the sidewalk, walking northward toward the track. But the engineer says when about three feet north of the northeast corner of Evers’ store he left the sidewalk and started across Berry r.oad to the east, as though he was going to the small station house situate on the south side of the railroad track, and thus did not appear to he moving
If Maginnis, who was seen by the engineer to be walking northward and toward the track on the plank sidewalk on the west side of Berry road, left the walk within three or four feet of the northeast corner of Evers’ store and started across the road to the eastward, toward the station, which the evidence shows stood seventeen feet south of the south — that is, the eastbound — railroad track, and then, upon reaching the east side of Berry road, suddenly turned to the northward and ran upon the track, as Mr. Hayes, the locomotive engineer, says he did, then it is entirely clear that the case should not have been submitted to the jury, for in such circumstances the time was too short to have given even a warning which would have availed the end desired; but there is evidence in the record, other and distinct from this, and such evidence, to my mind, is thoroughly contradictory of that given by the engineer. On the former appeal, engineer Hayes testified on the part of defendant, but on the last trial plaintiff put him on the stand, and this seems to confuse the issue more or less. But, obviously, plaintiff is entitled to the most favorable view of the evidence in the case, and this is true though the evidence of one witness appears to be contradictory to another. Such is expressly ruled in Rollison v. Wabash R. R. Co., 252 Mo. 525, 160 S. W. 994.
There is evidence on the part of plaintiff tending to prove that Maginnis was on the.plank walk pass
The evidence seems to be conclusive that decedent was run upon and killed on the northeast corner of the crossing and that he had walked at least sixteen feet on the track — -the full length of the crossing — before the collision occurred. If he was seen by the engineer neap Evers’ store while walking on the sidewalk — and the corner of Evers’ store is only fifty-seven feet south of the railroad track — and then entered upon the track at the southeast corner of the crossing, as this evidence reveals, the locomotive engineer appears to have been remiss in his duty in not sounding an alarm before he did.
The engineer testifies that he sounded the alarm to warn Maginnis of the approach of the train when the locomotive was within forty, sixty, or seventy-five feet of him and the train was running from forty to forty-five miles per hour. The plaintiff is entitled to the most favorable estimate given here by the engineer, for, in determining the question as to whether a primafacie case was made, not only all reasonable inferences in favor of plaintiff’s case must be allowed to her and all reasonable inferences in favor of defendant rejected, but the most favorable view of the evidence as well. Such is the established rule of decision, as we understand it. [See Buesching v. Gaslight Co., 73 Mo. 219.] The engineer admits seeing plaintiff when he was near Evers’ store on the sidewalk and says he had his eye on him all the time thereafter. If this is true, then, obviously, the locomotive, running at forty or forty-five miles per hour, must have been
There can be no doubt that the overwhelming evidence goes to the effect, indeed, if it is not conceded, that the decedent was run upon at the northeast corner of the road crossing proper — that is, on the east end of the north plank of the crossing. If this be true, then, according to the evidence of Butterworth, defendant’s civil engineer, who made measurements for defendant but testified respecting them at the instance of plaintiff, Maginnis came to his death eleven feet west of the point that tbe engineer says that he entered upon the track, and if this be true, then the evidence showing Maginnis to have come on the crossing at the southwest corner of it and running lengthwise of the crossing to the northeast corner, where the locomotive 'ran upon him, is squarely contradictory to the evidence given by the locomotive engineer, to the effect that he came upon the track on the east side of Berry road, but suddenly turned towards it immediately opposite the sidewalk on the east side of Berry road, which ran from the railroad track north.
In this connection it is to be said the railroad tracks ran east and west, or practically so, while Berry road runs north and south, or practically so. Berry road is forty feet wide. On the east side of Berry road and north of the railroad track a sidewalk had
We copy from the record the following questions and answers pertaining to this matter: “Q. Now, did you make any effort there to ascertain the course of Mr. Maginnis or his whereabouts at the time he was struck? A. After the train had left we — several of us went out. It had been raining that night or early morning, and the crossing was muddy. The mud from the
It is true that a number of questions and answers above copied relate to the tracks of Maginnis at and about the road crossing, for such was the subject-matter to which the witness’ attention was then being directed. Rut the last question and answer, as follows— “ Q. And you found about how many footprints that in your judgment were those of Mr. Maginnis? A. We found at'least a half dozen. That is from the plank walk up” — apparently relate to probably twenty-five feet of open space between the end of the plank walk and the southwest corner of the road crossing. At any rate, this evidence indicates that there were footprints made by Maginnis “from the plank walk up.” This bit of evidence does not seem to be mentioned in the majority opinion, and it is said therein that the evidence of Evers with respect to footprints seems to be entirely as to footprints appearing at and about the crossing. In my judgment this is invading the province of the jury, for the jury are to allow every reasonable inference in favor of plaintiff when the question of a prima-facie case is being considered and at the same
Further on in the testimony, these questions and answers appear: “Q. You found indications that Mr. Maginnis had probably stepped on the edge of the crossing boards here and had continued diagonally across towards the north rail, did you? A. Yes, sir.” . . . The witness also says: “The break, I remember very distinctly, was in the left shoe, for the reason that we had an argument — . ’ ’ And the witness says at another place the footprints that they found and of which he spoke were footprints made by a left shoe containing such a break. The question and answer concerning this are as follows: “Q. Did you find any footprints corresponding to that foot from which that shoe was? A. I certainly did; yes, sir. Q. The prints were footprints of the left foot? A. Yes, sir. . . . By Mr. Arnold (Q1.): Will you let me ask him one question? The footprints you speak about, were they on the crossing boards between the rails of the track or were they on the crosswalk south of the track? A. Part of them, if I remember was on the planking and part of them was off of the planking on the mud that was on the roadway. Q. Mud on what? A. Mud on the cinders. Q. Where %vas that mud on the cinders, east or west of the crossway? A. The mud, in driving the wagons would naturally bring the mud up, probably twenty feet ivide there.” Further on, the witness says, in speaking of these footprints about the crossing, as follows: “Q. At which end of the crossing boards? A. At the west side of Berry road. Q. Now, there is one photograph here which shows a. crosswalk down here. This crossing — this sidewalk that runs in front of your store there, you didn’t find any prints there? A. No, we couldn’t on the plank. Q. No footprints on that plank walk that runs in front of your store? A. No. The Court: Does that answer your question, Mr. Juryman? I think he wants the witness to inform him
When these questions and answers are read all together, it appears to indicate that decedent came upon the track at the west end of the crossing planks, and the crossing is nearly about the center of Berry road —that is, at the southwest corner of the wagon road crossing, — and the last answer quoted says that he was headed toward this walk over here — that is, to the
The opinion of the court seems to overlook entirely the question of the various measurements and distances detailed in the evidence by the civil engineer and also the situation of Evers’ store, the signboard, and the trees and their tendency to obscure the view from a locomotive running from the westward. The evidence appears to be quite convincing that the locomotive engineer could not have seen Maginnis when three feet north of the northeast corner of Evers’ store because the rear end of the store and the signboard and the growing trees obstructed the view from any point that the locomotive engineer might have occupied
I deem the opinion of the court to be in conflict with the decision of the Supreme Court in Buesching v. Gaslight Co., 73 Mo. 219, in that it rejects competent inferences from the evidence in favor of a primafaeie case for plaintiff and utilizes inferences from such evidence to the contrary. I deem it to be also in conflict with the decision of the Supreme Court in
Entertaining this view, I respectfully request that the case be certified to the Supreme Court for final determination, in accordance with the mandate of the Constitution.
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.