Connelley v. New York Central Railroad

Headnote

Negligence — railroads — action by passenger to recover for assault by Pullman porter.

Connelley v. N. Y. Central R. R. Co., 206 App. Div. 652 , affirmed.

Appeal, by permission, from a judgment of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the fourth judicial

department, entered March 29, 1923, unanimously affirming 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. The complaint alleged that the plaintiff was a passenger occupying a coach of the defendant, and that the defendant negligently and carelessly permitted its agent and servant, and agents and servants of the corporation with which defendant has a contract for the carriage of its, defendant’s, passengers, to stab, cut, assault and wound this plaintiff with a knife, and this defendant did carelessly and negligently fail to afford and furnish to this plaintiff the protection the defendant is required to furnish its passengers. At the time of the alleged assault, the porter committing the same, who was concededly in the employ of the Pullman Company, had left the Pullman car to which he was assigned, for the purpose of assisting to a coach an intending passenger who did not have Pullman transportation, the assault occurring after said porter had left his said car, had walked the length of the station platform, and had boarded said coach.