Murtha v. New York Homeopathic Medical College & Flower Hospital

Headnote

Murtha v. N. Y. Homeopathic Medical College & Flower Hospital, 183 App. Div. 886 , affirmed.

Appeal from a judgment of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the first judicial department, entered March 15, 1918, affirming a judgment in favor of plaintiff entered upon a verdict directed by the court. The action was to recover damages for personal injuries sustained in a collision between a taxicab in which the plaintiff was riding and a motor ambulance owned by the defendant, claiming that such collision was due to the negligence of the driver of said ambulance. The defendant alleged as a defense that it was a charitable organization engaged in the maintenance of a hospital for the aid and care of the indigent sick and injured, and that on the occasion of this accident the ambulance in question and its driver were not in the service of the defendant, but in the service of the board of ambulance service of the city of New York, assisting in the performance of certain governmental duties imposed upon that board by the statutes of this state, and that for this reason this defendant may not be held responsible for the negligence of the driver under the rule of respondeat superior.