Shank v. Edison Electric Illuminating Co.
Shank v. Edison Electric Illuminating Co.
Opinion of the Court
Opinion by
The plaintiff was a lineman in the employ of the defendant company. An interruption having occurred in the circuit, he ascertained by using the switch board at the power plant where the trouble was on the line. Before proceeding to make the necessary repair, in the presence of his foreman, the company’s electrician and the engineer in charge of the engine, he turned off the current, and told those present not to turn it on until he was heard from. He then started in company with his foreman to the place of interruption. Within a half an hour after he left, the electrician and the engineer went to the switch board and tested the circuit. No break being disclosed by the test, the engineer turned on the current, with the result that the plaintiff, then engaged with the wires in repairing the break, received the charge and was severely injured. Manifestly the plaintiff was injured through negligence not his own. Was it the company’s negligence or the negligence of a fellow employee? In the general business in which defendant is engaged, furnishing electric light and power, the interruption of the circuit from one cause and another is a matter of such frequent occurrence, that it is necessary to keep steadily employed trained men whose business it is to make repairs in the line and maintain it in working condition. It is alike necessary to employ others of technical skill to co-operate in this general work. The whole business of repairing the line, whether regard be had to the actual work on the line, or the care of the circuit while men are so engaged, must necessarily be done by employees engaged in the general business under the direction of the employer. It would be wholly impracticable for an employer to personally attend to such detail, and therefore it is that such work may be properly, and commonly is, intrusted to employees. Where this is so the duty of- the employer extends no further than to employ competent and suitable fellow servants and supply them with everything needed for the work. In all such cases the employee is presumed to have con
Reference
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- Shank v. Edison Electric Illuminating Company
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- 4 cases
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- Syllabus
- Negligence — Electric light companies — Master and servant — Fellow servant. Where a lineman employed by an electric light company after having located a break in a circuit, turns off the current, and directs the electrician and engineer not to turn it on again until he is heard from, and the latter disregard his request and turn on the current, and he is injured, the lineman cannot recover from his company for his injuries without showing that eithef the electrician or the engineer had charge of the line or switch board, or some particular part of the company’s business, or what, if any, duty was delegated to either. In the absence of such proof the court is bound to hold that the electrician and engineer were fellow servants of the lineman.