Clark v. Northern Pacific Railway Co.

Citations

• 29 Wash. 139
• 69 P. 636
• 1902 Wash. LEXIS 568

Syllabus

<p>DEATH OE CHILD-ACTION BY MOTHER.</p> <p>Under Bal. Code, § 4829, which provides that “a father, or in case of the death or desertion of his family the mother, may maintain an action as plaintiff for the injury or death of a child,” the mother is entitled to maintain such action, where the parents had been divorced and the deceased child had been awarded the husband, who had returned him to the mother after a period of two weeks with a promise to support him, but wholly neglected to contribute thereto, and had disappeared, casting the duty of support and education upon the child’s mother.</p> <p>NEGLIGENCE • — ■ IMPLIED INVITATION ON DANGEROUS PREMISES.</p> <p>The rule making the owner of premises liable for injuries received as the result of implied invitation to children to enter upon dangerous premises is inapplicable in the case of a lease by a railway company of land on one side of its switch yard for a circus exhibition, to which a short cut could be taken through the yards, when there was a well traveled highway leading around the switch yard to the circus grounds, and the switch yard was enclosed by a fence, contained no other defect or danger than that inherent to moving trains, and the injured child had been twice warned to get off the premises by switchmen, while he was attempting to cross.</p> <p>SAME-EXCLUSION OE EVIDENCE-HARMLESS ERROR.</p> <p>The exclusion of a show bill, offered in evidence for the purpose of establishing an inducement' to the public to go upon the railway company’s premises was harmless, it error at all, when the company had admitted in its answer that it leased the grounds for show purposes, thereby admitting notice that the public would be in attendance.</p>