Van Duzer v. Commonwealth Telephone Co.
Van Duzer v. Commonwealth Telephone Co.
Opinion of the Court
Opinion by
The plaintiff here sought to recover damages for personal injuries alleged to have resulted from the negligence of the defendant company. The case has been tried twice. The first trial resulted in a judgment of compulsory nonsuit, which the court refused to take off. Upon appeal to this court (VanDuzer v. Telephone Co., 236 Pa. 538) the judgment was reversed with a procedendo. It appears from the evidence at the last trial that plaintiff was employed under the authority of the defendant’s division superintendent to assist in the work of building telephone lines. He was engaged to do general work and probably a little climbing. He objected somewhat to the climbing as he was without experience in that work. He was told that the company would furnish tools and belts, and whatever was needed to work with, and would keep everything in repair. He was furuished by Mr. Irwin, superintendent of the work, with the harness which he used in climbing, and which proved to be defective. A witness, Charles Eichsted, testified that about two weeks before the accident to plaintiff, he called the attention of Irwin, the superin
We find nothing in the evidence in this record, to change our conclusion, reached in the former appeal, that the questions 6f the negligence of the defendant, and the contributory negligence of the plaintiff, were not properly to be disposed of by the court as questions of law, but were for the consideration of the jury, under proper instructions. No complaint is made of the manner in which these questions were submitted. The only contention here is that the trial judge should have taken these questions from the jury, and should have given binding instructions in favor of the defendant. This would have been in plain disregard of the decision of this court in this case upon the former appeal.
The assignments of error are overruled, and the judgment is affirmed.
Reference
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- Negligence — Master and servant — Telephone companies — Defective climbing harness — Contributory negligence — Case for jury. In an action against a telephone company to recover damages for personal injuries, the case is for the jury and a verdict for the plaintiff -will be sustained, where there is evidence that the plaintiff was employed by the defendant to aid in the construction of its lines, although he was without experience at this kind of work; that the defendant’s superintendent furnished him, for the purpose of climbing poles, an appliance in the nature of a harness which fitted to the body, although the superintendent knew two weeks before the accident that the harness was defective; that the superintendent told plaintiff that the harness was “perfectly safe; you cannot fall in them; and you can do this work as well as any one”; that due to a defect in the metallic snap fastened to the end of the harness, plaintiff fell and suffered the injuries complained of; and that the defect in the snap was not apparent at a glance. Van Duzer v. Commonwealth Telephone Company, 236 Pa. 538, followed.