Barrett v. Banner Shingle Co.

Citations

• 45 Wash. 12
• 87 P. 919
• 1906 Wash. LEXIS 913

Syllabus

<p>Master and Servant — Negligence—-Youthful Employee — Failure to Instruct — Question for Jury. In an action against a master for personal injuries, tbe negligence of the defendant is for the jury and a nonsuit is properly denied, where an inexperienced boy sixteen years of age was injured through his misunderstanding of a signal given by a sawyer whom he was sent to assist without any instructions as to the details of the work or as to the signals to be observed.</p> <p>Same — Contributory Negligence. The contributory negligence of an inexperienced youthful employee in stumbling over projecting beams in a narrow passage, whereby he fell and threw his hand into a saw, is for the jury, where the beams were partially covered with sawdust, and he was responding to a supposed signal by the sawyer to go through such passage, and had a right to assume that the same was safe, and no instructions were given him as to his work or the signals to be observed.</p> <p>Same — Contributory Negligence — Act Contrary to Custom — ■ Notice. Where a servant was injured in going through, a passage at the direction of a vice principal, evidence that it was not customary to go through such passage is inadmissible, where the plaintiff had no notice of the custom.</p> <p>Same — Evidence—Changed Conditions Subsequent to Accident— Instructions. Where an employee was injured through stumbling over projecting beams which were partly covered with sawdust and debris, it is not prejudicial error to receive evidence that after the accident the debris was cleared away, where the jury were instructed that they could not consider the same for the purpose of finding negligence, but only to explain the plaintiff’s evidence as to the appearance of the beams at the time of the accident.</p>