Case ID: mich_46/html/0439-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Campbell, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

The People v. Samuel McKay.
    
      Railway stations — Rights of expeetm'ating passengers-
    
    Í Railway passengers are entitled to remain in tlie waiting room at a station ' as long as they have occasion to do so, and commit no offense against the good order of the place and reasonable regulations made to govern it; they are not bound to leave on being ordered out by the keeper for any such indecorum as spitting on, the flooi^Jand the refusal to go on being ordered will not excuse the commission of an: assault and battery upon them to compel them to.
    
      A railway station keeper assaulted a passenger for not leaving the waiting room when ordered, the passenger having enraged him by spitting on the floor. Held, that in defending an action for the assault and battery a question as to the plaintiffs smoking was irrelevant, where his smoking had not been objected to.
    Exceptions before judgment from Cass.
    Submitted June 23.
    Decided June 29.
    Information for assault and battery. Despondent was convicted below.
    Affirmed.
    Attorney General Jacob J. Van Riper for the People.
    Words cannot justify an assault: Tiff. Crim. Law 574.
    
    
      Howell & Carr for respondent.
    The keeper of a railway station house is not guilty of assault in ejecting a person if he has no notice or knowledge of his right to remain there: Com. v. Power 7 Met. 596.
   Campbell, J.

McKay was convicted of assault and battery on Thomas Cooley, at the Grand Trunk station at Edwardsburg, in Cass county. McKay was station. keeper, and the assault originated in an altercation between them caused by Cooley’s spitting on the floor. He was smoking at the time, but no objection was made to this, and a question about it was properly held irrelevant. The defendant made a somewhat violent assault, and subsequently called in another servant of the company who compelled Cooley to leave the room, which he had refused to do at the demand of McKay. Cooley was a passenger on a train stopping temporarily at the station.

The court charged the jury very distinctly that if Cooley violated any rule made either by the company or the agent which had been brought home to his knowledge, the respondent had a right to require him to leave the waiting-room, and to remove him by such force as was necessary.

We think this charge was quite strong enough in favor of respondent. It is absurd to claim that the traveling community are bound to govern their behavior by the whims of an obstinate station-house keeper, or to leave the room whenever he thinks proper to drive them out. They are invited by the railroad company, and are entitled to remain there so long as they have occasion to do so, and commit no offence against the good order of the place and the reasonable regulations made to govern it.

The conviction was regular, and it must be certified to the court below that the people are entitled to judgment on it.

The other Justices concurred.