Capital Traction Co. v. Hoover

Citations

• 45 App. D.C. 247
• 1916 U.S. App. LEXIS 2679

Syllabus

<p>Street Railways; Negligence; Variance; Instructions to Jury; Direction of Verdict; Prejudicial Error; Examination of Witnesses.</p> <p>1. Where the declaration in an action against a street railway company to recover damages sustained by the plaintiff while a passenger charges • that the company’s ear had been stopped in order to permit the plaintiff and his family, including his daughter, to alight, and that while the plaintiff was on the platform assisting his daughter to alight, the car was accidentally started throwing the plaintiff to the ground and injuring him, it is not error for the trial court to instruct the jury that if the plaintiff had alighted from the ear and then boarded it again while it was still at rest to assist his daughter to alight, and while the plaintiff was in the act of returning to the car for that purpose and before he could again alight from it with his daughter-, and while he and his daughter were attempting to do so, the car was started and the plaintiff thrown to the ground and injured, he is entitled to recover; nor is it error in such a case for. the court to refuse to direct a verdict for the defendant where the evidence supports the plaintiff’s declaration, or to refuse to instruct the jury at the defendant’s request that the plaintiff cannot recover •unless he had actually taken his daughter in his arms before the car was started.</p> <p>Note. — As to duty of street car conductor to see that passenger is off before starting car, see note in 11 L.R.A. (N.S.) 140.</p> <p>As to negligence in starting street ear with jerk while passenger is alighting, see notes in 23 L.R.A. (N.S.) 891, and 34 L.R.A. (N.S.) 225.</p> <p>2. While prejudicial error cannot be predicated upon refusal of the trial court to permit, counsel for the defendant to see and inspect a paper shown a witness for the plaintiff and read by him while on the witness stand at the close of the redirect examination of the witness but not/ offered in evidence, where the