Director General of Railroads v. State ex rel. Hurst

Citations

• 135 Md. 496

Syllabus

<p>Negligence• — Railroad Crossing — Lowering Cates — Duty of Traveller to Stop — Instructions.</p> <p>A prayer submitted by plaintiff which is only a damage prayer and does not go to the right of recovery, everything • therein being predicated on the finding of a verdict for plaintiff, is not defective because, in providing for a measure of dam■■•ages, it fails to require a finding of negligence on the part of rdefendant, and makes no reference to the question of contributory negligence, these matters being covered by other granted prayers. p. 504</p> <p>That safety gates at the crossing at which plaintiff’s husband was killed were manipulated by a mechanism involving the turning of a handle, and that the gate watchman testified that it ordinarily required five seconds to lower them, did not show it to be physically impossible for one of the gates to have been suddenly dropped upon the automobile of deceased, as testified to by plaintiff’s witnesses, and so to'call for the direction of a verdict for defendant on the assumption that the testimony of these witnesses was untrue, it being possible that the gateman’s testimony was untrue, and also that the mechanism of the gate in question was not in perfect order. p. 505</p> <p>Nor was evidence of these witnesses, that the gate thus dropped struck deceased on the neck, and that the blow disabled him and broke the gate, without injuring his companions, so incredible as to call for the direction of a verdict for defendant. p. 505</p> <p>Where safety gates are maintained at a railroad crossing, an open gate is a substantial assurance of safety, and a traveller is not bound to stop before crossing, except when danger in crossing is apparent notwithstanding the open gate; and in other eases the question whether one injured, while crossing through an open gate, was guilty of contributory negligence is for the jury. „ p. 507</p>