Estes v. St. Paul, Minneapolis & Manitoba R. R. Co. — 27 N.Y. St. Rep. 594

Majority

p. 594

Benjamin Estes, Resp’t, v. The St. Paul, Minneapolis & Manitoba R. R. Co., App’lt.

(Supreme Court, General Term, Second Department,

Filed December 9, 1889.)

Headnote

Common carrier—Liability tor injurt to baggage.

Defendant received baggage of plaintiff to be checked to Chicago, but sent it to St. Paul. When received in Brooklyn it was damaged by water. It was shown that it was not exposed to the action of water after it left St. Paul, and that at that place it was only protected by a shed. Held, that defendant was liable.

Appeal from judgment in favor of plaintiff, entered on the report of a referee.

p. 595

Action to recover damages to baggage, caused by being wet while in the custody of defendant, a common carrier. The facts in relation thereto appear fully in the opinion.

Frank F. Smith, for app’lt; F. E. Barnard, for resp’t.

The case shows that the plaintiff had tickets -on the road of the defendant as a passenger from Laramie to Fargo by way of Grand Forks. On the 2d of September, 1886, he delivered his baggage to the defendant’s baggage-master. The baggage was to be checked by the train upon which plaintiff was to travel, but was to be checked for Chicago, which would involve a change of road at Fargo to be carried to Chicago. The defendant failed to check the baggage by this route, but sent it to St. Paul over another of its roads, a much greater distance. The only question in the case is one of fact. Was the baggage injured by negligent exposure on the route from Laramie to St. Paul ?

It is proven that when it arrived at New York it was injured by water. The proof tends to show that on the evening of the day the baggage was received by the defendant it rained very hard and nearly or quite all night.

The baggage was received in St. Paul on September 3, 1886, in the morning. The same was delivered to the defendant in good order and dry. There is proof tending to show that the baggage was not exposed to the action of water after it reached St. Paul

This proof covers the entire distance to the plaintiff's house in Brooklyn. When it reached this place it was seriously injured by water. The injury was not of a date later than the arrival of the same at St. Paul, as was fairly inferrable from the appearance of the baggage. The mold was not recent. There is proof tending to show that at St. Paul the place where baggage is placed waiting for transfer is only protected by the projecting eaves of a shed, and that in a storm with a wind the eaves are not such a protection as will prevent the baggage from being wetted by the rain. Under this evidence the referee was justified in finding the injury to have been caused while the baggage was in defendant’s possession.

Assuming this fact, the case is a plain one. The defendant agreed to send to send baggage by a particular route, and violated its agreement and sent it by another and much longer route, and while in its possession permitted it to be injured by negligent exposure to water. The defendant was an insurer. Isaacson v. N. Y. Central, etc., R. R., 94 N. Y., 278 .

The cases cited to show that the liability of a railroad extends no further than its delivery to the connecting carriers have no applicability to the facts.

The judgment should, therefore, be affirmed, with costs.

Pratt, J., concurs.