Nollmeyer v. Tacoma Railway & Power Co.

Citations

• 95 Wash. 595
• 164 P. 229
• 1917 Wash. LEXIS 855

Syllabus

<p>Carriers — Setting Down Passengers — Negligence—Instructions. In an action for personal injuries received by a passenger in alighting from a street car, an instruction that the burden was upon the plaintiff to establish that he was thrown from the car substantially in the manner charged in the complaint, that is, by reason of the negligence of the conductor in starting the car while plaintiff was in the act of alighting, carries the implication that he could not recover if plaintiff’s injuries were caused by an attempt on his part to jump from the car while it was in motion, and is as favorable to the defendant as it had any right, to expect, especially where there was no evidence that the plaintiff attempted to alight while the car was in motion.</p> <p>Same — Setting Down Passengers — Contributory Negligence — Instructions. In an action for personal injuries sustained by a passenger in alighting from a street car, a requested instruction that the defendant would not be liable if the plaintiff attempted to alight from the car while it was in motion, is properly refused, as it is not necessarily contributory negligence to alight from a moving street car.</p> <p>Appeal — Review — Instructions — Requests. Error cannot be predicated upon the refusal of a requested instruction unless the instruction as requested is substantially correct, and an instruction in part correct and partly incorrect may be refused as a whole.</p> <p>Same. It is not error to refuse to give instructions in the exact language requested, where they are amply covered in the instructions given.</p> <p>Same — Preservation of Grounds — Specific Objections — Harmless Error. Prejudicial error cannot be predicated upon an improper question and answer to the effect that the plaintiff did not have the money for a necessary surgical operation, where it was objected to as incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial and the court was asked to disregard it, whereupon the court promptly sustained the objection, a