Yeager v. Gately & Fitzgerald, Inc.

Citations

• 262 Pa. 466
• 106 A. 76
• 1919 Pa. LEXIS 706

Syllabus

<p>Negligence — Infant—Collision between truclc and boy’s sled— Coasting — Contributory negligence — 1Evidence—Case for jury.</p> <p>1. In an action to recover damages for the death of a child six years old, killed while coasting in a collision between his sled and defendant’s truck, the question of the negligence of the driver of the truck is for the jury, where the evidence for plaintiff, although in some respects contradicted, tended to show that the accident happened between three and four o’clock in the afternoon; that the boy was coasting down grade on a sidewalk on the right-hand side of a street, which crossed the street at right angles along which the truck was approaching; that the truck was driven on the left side of the street within two or three feet of the curb; that its proper place was on the right side of the street; that the sled and truck both moving at the rate of six to eight miles an hour, collided practically at the instant the sled left the sidewalk and entered the crossing; that according to plaintiff’s witnesses, although contradicted, the driver did not sound his horn; that the driver knew that children were coasting at this intersection, and that the driver could have seen the child when the truck was at least fifty feet from the crossing.</p> <p>2. In such a case the parents’ contributory negligence is also a question for the jury, where the evidence tends to show that the boy was sent by his mother on an errand to a store, a block and one-half from house; that the mother had forbidden him to coast down the hill; that he had taken his sled without his mother’s knowledge; that the neighborhood was a residential one without car tracks on either of the streets where the accident occurred; that there was little traffic on them except by pedestrians; that the boy was in the habit of going alone to a neighboring school, and was familiar with the neighborhood; and that there was nothing to show that the boy was exposed to any greater danger whe