Pacheco v. Judson Manufacturing Co.
Before: Britt
Synopsis
Negligence—Master and Servant—Unsafe Appliance — Defective Shears for Cutting Iron—Failure to Inspect.—A corporation engaged in the business of manufacturing iron and steel machinery, and using heavy shears operated by steam for the cutting of boiler iron, owes to its servants the duty of exercising ordinary care to keep them in a safe condition, and to use such practicable means and tests as common prudence shows to be proper for discovering defects which might bccur with time and use; and where such tests were not applied, and the shears, being cracked and weakened, broke, to the injury of an employee, on account of such discoverable defect in their condition, the corporation is liable for such injury.
Id.—Inference of Negligence—Question of Fact—Nonsuit.—Whether the inference and conclusion of negligence should be drawn from the evidence, is a question of fact to be determined by the jury from all the circumstances in the case, where the court can see that it might be so inferred; and, in such case, it is error to order a nonsuit.
Id.—Evidence—Dangerous Condition of Shears—Charge as to Management— Leading Question—Opinion op Witness.—Evidence is admissible to show that instructions were given to pick out quick and active men to work at the shears, so that they might get away from the shears in case of accident, as tending to show that defendant knew the shears to he a dangerous instrumentality; but it is not error to exclude a question which is leading, or which calls for the opinion of the witness ¡giving such evidence.
Id.—Breaking oe Other Shears—Duty of Inspectors — Faulty Construction.—It is competent to prove that other shears made by defendant for cutting iron at its works had broken, as tending to establish the propriety of inspecting such machinery for defects; but where the injury arose from keeping the shears causing the injury in an unsafe condition, it is not permissible to inquire whether other shears broke because of faulty construction, such inquiry being collateral and irrelevant.
Id.—Expert Evidence — Exercise of Ordinary Care — Question for Jury.—An expert witness may properly testify that a defect Is discoverable by applying certain tests specified, but he cannot be permitted to testify whether it would have been discoverable by ordinary care and precaution, that being part of the ultimate question of negligence to be determined by the jury.
Britt, C. Defendant is a corporation engaged in the business of manufacturing iron and steel machinery. On April 7, 1892, plaintiff was employed at its works, and, while he was assisting in cutting up a plate of boiler iron by means of a pair of shears weighing some twelve tons and operated by steam, the casting forming the body of the lever or upper jaw of the shears broke; a fragment thereof fell upon plaintiff, and he sustained serious injury; he prosecutes this action to recover [544]damages, claiming that defendant was negligent both in the construction of the shears and the oversight of them after completion. At the trial, plaintiff having closed his evidence, the court directed a nonsuit, observing that a case of ordinary neglect by defendant was not made out.
It seems to have been assumed by the court and the parties on the trial that danger to the person of plaintiff was to be apprehended as a result of the breaking of the shears; this being predicated, there was evidence that the shears were made by defendant itself about October, 1891; the jaw or lever which broke was a heavy casting having a perpendicular section of two feet or more and a breadth of about eight inches; it moved on a horizontal journal which was lubricated through a tube extending from an oilhole at the top of the casting to the journal; oil poured into this tube sometimes ran over on the outside of the casting; when the casting broke, the line of the fracture extended through the same from a point close to the oilhole diagonally downward to the lower side. There was further evidence— not without conflict—that one side- of the sectional area exposed by the fracture looked blue and fresh as if then just broken; and that the other side, nearly one-half of the broken surface, was black and more or less stained with oil, as if it had been previously cracked and oil had run down the crack. The exterior of the casting was covered with dust, and it is not claimed that the crack, if any there was before the event in question, was known to anyone or was perceptible by ordinary observation; it was, however, in evidence that such a crack, if it existed, might have been detected by applying tests—as by sounding the casting with a hammer; that the only test of the shears ever made was in their practical operation about the work for which they were constructed, they having previously cut metal much heavier than the piece on which the lever broke; that such shears sometimes break in use, and that shears of [545]
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