Finch v. Willmott

CARY, P. J.

Plaintiff brought action against the two defendants to recover damages for injuries she received from falling downstairs. From a judgment in her favor rendered by the court sitting without a jury, defendants appeal. The principal questions involved are the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain the findings, the applicability of the doctrine of

res ipsa loquitur

and whether the plaintiff was herself guilty of contributory negligence.

The two defendants were the owners of a two-story office and apartment building. On the ground floor were stores. On the second floor, reached by a single common stairway, were offices and housekeeping apartments. Plaintiff resided in one of these apartments and had lived there for approximately two and a half years before the accident. The defendants had owned the building about a year prior thereto. Plaintiff and her husband had agreed with the defendants to sweep this common hall and stairway once a week. For this they received five dollars a month credit on their rent. This stairway consisted of twenty steps and was covered with carpet. On the tread portion of each step a rubber matting seven inches wide and sixteen inches long had been tacked and according to plaintiff’s theory the dilapidated condition of this matting was the proximate cause of the

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accident. About 7:30 on the morning in question the plaintiff, a woman some fifty years' of age, started down the stairway from her apartment, carrying a dishpan in which was some wet washing. Her purpose was to hang this washing out to dry and this stairway was her only means of descent. A few steps from the top she tripped and fell, sustaining the injuries for which she recovered judgment in the court below.

Appellants contend that the evidence fails to show the proximate cause of the fall, that the findings of the court that it was due to the defective and dilapidated condition of the rubber matting is pure conjecture, that from all the evidence the fall might be due just as much to a condition for which no liability attaches as otherwise, that the failure of plaintiff to show that some act or omission of defendants was the cause of the fall is fatal to plaintiff's recovery, that, plaintiff’s version of her fall and the manner in which she landed are entirely contrary to human experience and therefore unbelievable, that the doctrine of