Evanovitch v. Philadelphia & Reading Coal & Iron Co.

Headnote

Negligence — master and servant — injury to employee in mine from falling rock — judgment for damages properly reversed in absence of evidence that his superior had been requested to furnish props.

Evanovitch v. Phila. & Reading Coal & Iron Co., 184 App. Div. 910 , affirmed.

Appeal from an order of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the second judicial department, entered May 24, 1918, reversing a judgment in favor of plaintiff entered upon a verdict in an action to recover for personal injuries alleged to have been sustained by plaintiff through the negligence of defendant, his employer. The complaint alleged that on June 11, 1914, while plaintiff was in defendant’s employ as a laborer in its anthracite mine known as Bear Valley Colliery at Bear Valley, Penn., he was struck and severely injured by heavy fragments of coal which fell from above, due to negligence both on the part of the defendant’s superintendent and on the part of its miner, plaintiff’s direct superior; that the superintendent was negligent in failing to supply necessary props and timbers and the miner, plaintiff’s immediate superior, in directing him to work

in a place which, by reason of the absence of props, was dangerous. The Appellate Division reversed the judgment and granted a new trial upon the ground that there was no evidence that the certified miner of the mine had been requested to furnish props.