Reed v. City of Spokane

Citations

• 21 Wash. 218
• 57 P. 803
• 1899 Wash. LEXIS 264

Syllabus

<p>NONSUIT-ACTION FOE NEGLIGENCE-CONTRIBUTORY NEGLIGENCE.</p> <p>A nonsuit in an action against a municipal corporation, to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by a fall into an excavation in a city street, will not be granted on the ground that the street was sufficiently lighted to enable a person in the exercise of ordinary care to discover the danger and avoid it, where the testimony is conflicting as to the amount of light afforded by the street lights at that point, and there is evidence that the night was dark and foggy.</p> <p>APPEAL — HARMLESS ERROR — ADMISSION OF EVIDENCE.</p> <p>Admission of testimony showing the condition of a crosswalk at the place of an accident to a pedestrian, at the time of the accident and on the day prior, is not prejudicial error.</p> <p>QUESTION FOE JURY — NEGLIGENCE—INJURIES ON HIGHWAYS.</p> <p>Whether sufficient barriers were erected by a municipal corporation across a crosswalk at each side of an excavation in a principal street, and whether lights were placed thereon, is a question for the jury in an action against the city to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by falling into the excar vation, where the testimony on that point is conflicting, and it is undisputed that, if any barriers or lights were erected or placed at that point, they were removed prior to the accident.</p> <p>INSTRUCTIONS-CONTRIBUTORY NEGLIGENCE.</p> <p>. An instruction on contributory negligence, that want of care, prudence or caution upon plaintiff’s part which “contributed in any material degree to his injury is fatal to his right of recovery,” is not erroneous because of the addition of the word “material.”</p> <p>SAME — EXCAVATIONS IN STREETS — DUTY OF CITY TO GUARD.</p> <p>An instruction that it is the duty of a municipal corporation to guard an excavation in its street by such “appropriate guards, barriers and beacon or danger lights” as will protect travelers on the street, using due care, from being injured thereby, is n