City of Sandwich v. Dolan

Citations

• 133 Ill. 177
• 24 N.E. 526

Syllabus

<p>_ 1. Negligence—contributory—absence of due care in passing along •a defective sidewalk. In, an action against a city the plaintiff can not recover for a personal injury caused by a defective sidewalk, however negligent the city may have been in failing to keep the walk in proper repair, unless -he was, at the time of the accident, exercising ordinary ■care to avoid injury.</p> <p>2. ' Same—duty to take a less dangerous route. Where there are two routes from one’s residence in a city to his place of destination, the one dangerous and the other entirely safe, and he, with knowledge of this fact, selects the dangerous one, and is injured while passing over the dangerous walk, it can not be said, as matter of law, that he is justified in having selected the dangerous route.</p> <p>3. While a party may not be required to take another less convenient sidewalk in returning to his home in the night time, his failure to do so will present a question of facfrwhether, in the selection of a route known by him to be dangerous, he was in the exercise of ordinary care for his safety.</p> <p>4. In a suit against a city to recover damages for a personal injury resulting from a defective sidewalk, the court, at the plaintiff’s request, instructed the jury, that if they believed, from the evidence, that the most direct route for the plaintiff in going to his place of destination ■and returning to his home in the city was over the sidewalk out of repair, then the fact, if shown, that such sidewalk over which plaintiff passed was defective, and had been in a defective condition for some months previous to the injury, would not oblige the plaintiff to take ■another less convenient sidewalk: Held, that the instruction was misleading, and erroneous.</p> <p>5. Same—want of proper care—as a question of fact. Whether or not a plaintiff exercised ordinary care to avoid a personal injury in passing ■over a defective sidewalk at the time and place of receiving such injury, is a question of f