Wolker v. Compañía Ferroviaria de Circunvalación
Wolker v. Compañía Ferroviaria de Circunvalación
Opinion of the Court
delivered the opinion of the court.
As the names of the Compañía de Ferrocarriles de Puerto Rico, Compañía Ferroviaria de Circunvalación de Puerto Rico and the American Railroad Company of Porto Rico will .he used frequently in the course of this opinion, we abbreviate them in the following form: The first will be called the Railroad Company, the second the Circumvallation Company and the third the American Company.
The plaintiff in this suit seeks to recover for damages to his automobile in an attempt to avoid a collision with a freight train that was crossing the road between Carolina and Río Piedras at a place near the Progreso Central. He brought his action against the Circumvallation Company, alleging that it is a public service corporation engaged in
The defendant made a general denial of each and all of the allegations of the complaint and after a trial judgment was rendered dismissing the complaint, whereupon the plaintiff raised the present appeal.
One of the grounds on which the trial court based its judgment was that the defendant, the Circumvallation Company, was not responsible for the accident for which damages are claimed for the reason that it was merely a stockholder of the American Company, which, according to the evidence, exercised authority over the train crews.
The evidence shows that the Railroad Company is the owner of the railroad line over which the American Company operates and that the Circumvallation Company does not operate or manage any railroad in this Island, it only having purchased through a syndicate stocks and bonds of the Railroad Company and the American Company; therefore, it can not be held liable for the acts of the employees of the American Company, which operates the railroads owned by the other company.
The only evidence presented by the plaintiff to show that his action was properly brought against the defendant is a letter written on July 24, 1920, by Emilio Jiménez, manager of the defendant, to the Public Service Commission, informing it that on April 10th of the same year a contract had been made between a representative of the stockholders of the Railroad Company and the stockholders and bondholders of the American Company of one part and a syndicate composed of three persons of the other part, in which it was agreed to sell to the syndicate the stock of the
As may be seen, that document does not prove that the defendant is operating the railroads, but just the opposite, for it is stated that the American Company operates them, although the Circumvallation Company purposes to take over the right of operation; nor does it prove that it holds all of the stock of the said corporation, although it intends to acquire all or the most of it. Besides, Emilio Jiménez, who is a director of the American Company and manager of the Circumvallation Company, testified positively that the American Company operates the trains running between San Juan and Carolina and that the Circumvallation Company is operating no trains, either under its own name or under the name of the American Company. Likewise, this evidence does not show that the American Company has transferred its business to the defendant, or even that it has acquired sufficient of its stock to give it the control of the business.
Affirmed.
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.