Laufer v. Shapiro

Headnote

Negligence — buildings — duty of owner of building to one who came therein in answer to a cry of distress — action for injuries received from fall through open trap door.

Laufer v. Shapiro (2 cases), 215 App. Div. 769 , affirmed.

Appeal in each of the above-entitled actions from a judgment of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the first judicial department, entered December 28, 1925, affirming a judgment in favor of plaintiff entered upon a verdict. The first action was to recover for personal injuries alleged to have been sustained by plaintiff through the negligence of defendant. The second, brought by the husband of the plaintiff in the first action, was to recover for expense caused and loss of her services by reason of the same accident. The defendant was the owner of a tenement house in which the janitress lived .in the basement. The plaintiff Dora Laufer was a friend of the janitress and, on the day of the accident, met her while marketing and walked with her to the entrance of her house. After standing and talking with her for a short time, the plaintiff left the janitress and started to go to her own home. The janitress went down the stairway to the basement, opened the door, took a step or two, and fell through a trap door which had been opened by plumbers in her absence. When a short distance away plaintiff, Dora Laufer, heard a scream and recognized it as the voice of the janitress. She thereupon turned back to the house, ran down to the basement door, opened it and rushed inside, whereupon she fell into the same uncovered trap and received the injuries for which damages are sought in these actions. (See 210 App. Div. 436 .)