Renfro v. Fresno City Railway Co.

It is alleged in plaintiff's complaint that while he was a passenger on a certain car operated by defendant corporation at the terminus of the railroad "where said car usually stopped for passengers to alight therefrom, and while said car had slowed up for the purpose of permitting passengers to get off from said car, the employees of said defendant who were then and there running said car and had the same under their charge and control, negligently and carelessly caused said car to be suddenly and violently jerked and started and put in rapid motion without allowing plaintiff sufficient time to alight therefrom; and in consequence of said negligent and careless action of said defendant's *Page 319 employees, and without any fault or negligence on the part of plaintiff, and as further consequence of the negligence and carelessness of defendant's said employees in running and conducting said car, plaintiff was violently thrown from said car to the ground and thereby sustained great injury, to wit," etc.

The attending surgeon testified that the injury was "to the right hip joint, the right thigh or femur, the bone near the hip joint, . . . . a fracture just inside the capsule of the joint, what we call an intra-capsular fracture." The injury occurred on February 4, 1904, and on January 12, 1905, when the trial closed, plaintiff was on crutches and the surgeon testified that he "did not think his patient would ever be able to get around and pursue his usual vocation in an active way," that of a bricklayer and plasterer. Plaintiff testified: "I was a passenger on an electric car. As I got out near the end of the line the car began to slow down, and it was along between 12 and 1, and I was in a hurry to get home for dinner, and I got ready to get off when it stopped. It slowed down, and was pretty near a stop, and I went to get off, and it gave a sudden jerk as 1 left go with my hand of the rail, the bar where I was holding on, and I had my weight on one foot and it threw me back on my side. I had my seat on the outside in the rear end of the car on the right-hand side, that would be the easterly side as I went out. I was standing on the lower step when I was thrown. I had hold of the bar — the iron. There is an iron post goes up outside of the other, the iron on the upright post. I was standing this way [showing], say we were going this way [the evidence is that the car was going north] and I had this hand [the left hand] a hold of the post and this foot [the right foot] was off the step, and this [the left foot] was on the step and just as I let go it jerked and threw me on this hip [the right hip]. My head fell to the south." He testified that the bottom step was about fifteen inches from the ground; that he was then about fifteen or twenty feet from the end of the track, and that the car went "but a little ways because I had to come down a little to get around it." He testified that he had frequently ridden on the car, and noticed that it stopped "anywhere along there clear from the end clear back as far as *Page 320 fifty, thirty or twenty feet, anywhere along there from the end." He was sitting about the middle of the rear seat on the east side. He testified: "I was holding on with my left hand, and put my right foot off first. My right foot was off the step, but was not on the ground when I was jolted loose." The motorman testified that there was nothing in the nature of a jolt or jar that attracted his attention in making the stop; that he threw the power off about ninety-four paces back and the car was running that time on its momentum, and he "stopped in the same way as always with the brake, which is customary." There was evidence that the effect of taking off the brake, if done too suddenly, will sometimes "give the car a jerk forward" if the car was going fast, and if going slowly "it would go ahead a little." The conductor testified that the car did not move more than three or four feet after plaintiff fell off; "it was practically stopped at that time." He "was standing on the rear end of the car, but did not notice plaintiff trying to get off." It does not appear that there were any other passengers on the car at the time.