Conaway v. Martin — 121 A.D. 551

Majority

p. 551

Mary A. Conaway, as Administratrix, etc., of Charles E. Conaway, Deceased, Respondent, v. William R. H. Martin, Appellant.

Second Department,

October 18, 1907.

Headnote

Uegligence — injury on elevator — failure to provide doors.

The plaintiff’s intestate was killed ¡it night in-the defendant’s elevator by having -, his head caught under the top of an archway as the elevator ascended. There was no light in the elevator nor any door either to the elevator or on • the inside of the archway under which the plaintiff's head was caught, to prevent a person in the elevator from .inadvertently leaning out under the arch.

B.eld, that a nonsuit'was properly denied;

That owing to the lack of light it was for the jury to say whether the defendant was negligent in not having a door to the elevator or a door upon the inside of . the archway.

Appeal by the defendant, William R. IT. Martin, from a judgment of the Supreme Court in favor of the plaintiff, entered in the . office of the clerk of the county of Kings on the 27th day of October, 1906, upon the verdict of a jury for $1,000, and also from an order entered in said clerk’s office on the 25th day of-October, 1906, denying the defendant’s ’motion for a new trial made upon tire minutes. . ■

Action for damages for negligence causing death.

The decedent was killed in the servants’ elevator of a’large apartment house, seven stories high, owned by the defendant. He entered the elevator in the basement. The elevator shaft is of solid masonry from bottom to top. In the basement the entrance to the e.levator is cut through the side of the shaft, which is 2 ft. 6 in. thick. Such- entrance is 3 ft. 8’ in. wide: ■ At the outside of it, . yiz., the outside line of the wall, two doors open outward. The opening or arch is 8 ft. 6 in. high. On the inside there was no door or gate to. enclose, those in the elevator from this entrance through the wail. As. the. elevator went up- the top of the head of the deceased struck the arch, the top. of the said entrance through the wall,-and he was killed. .It was quite dark in the elevator. The entrance doors being closed, the'only light that came into the elevator was through a pane of glass 9 in. by 11 in. in the middle of each door. The elevator cap was, 4 ft. 2 in. deep and.. 7 ft. 3 in. wide. ’

p. 552

L. Sidney Carrére, for the appellant.

John C. Robinson, for the respondent.

■ The motion to dismiss at the close was properly denied. Especially owing to the lack of light, it was a, question of. fact whether it was not negligent not to have a door or gate in the elevator car itself, or else oh the inside of the opening or arcli through the wall which was the entrance to the elevator car, to prevent persons in the car from inadvertently getting so cl osé. to the entrance side of the car as to.strike against the top of the said opening or arch if they happened to lean over a little as the car was going up..

The judgment should be affirmed^

Present—Jenks, Hooker, Gaynor, Rich and Miller, JJ.

Judgment and order unanimously affirmed,- with costs.