Stephanik v. Baltimore & Ohio Railroad

Citations

• 243 Pa. 43
• 89 A. 827
• 1914 Pa. LEXIS 573

Syllabus

<p>Negligence — Railroads—Employees—Scope of duty — Ejecting person from engine — Rules of company.</p> <p>1. Where a child, not a trespasser, is upon an engine of a railroad company, there is a duty resting upon the engineer or fireman in .putting him off to see that he is not ejected in such a manner as to imperil his life or limb, and this duty is no less imperative because the child is held as a prisoner in the cab, in consequence of an unauthorized act of an employee of defendant company.</p> <p>2. Plaintiff’s child, a boy nine years of age, while playing near a train of cars of defendant company, was seized by the brakeman upon suspicion of having taken coal from the cars and imprisoned in the cab of the engine. A rule of the company forbade any person to be allowed in the cab except the employees of defendant company. A few minutes later the engineer or fireman frightened the child into jumping from the engine, and in doing so he fell in front of a moving locomotive on an adjoining track and was killed. Held, the act of the engineer or fireman in frightening the child from the cab was within the scope of his employment, and a verdict and judgment in favor of the plaintiff was sustained.</p>