Case ID: ill-app_204/html/0485-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mr. Justice Holdom", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Mary Smeckpeper, Appellant, v. Chicago Railways Company and Ervin C. Hagerman, Appellees.
    Gen. No. 22,759.
    (Not to be reported in full.)
    Appeal from the Circuit Court of Cook county; the Hon. Charles M. Walker, Judge, presiding. Heard in this court at the October term, 1916.
    Affirmed as to Chicago Railways Company and reversed and remanded for a new trial as to Hagerman.
    Opinion filed March 26, 1917.
    Statement of the Case.
    Action by Mary Smeckpeper, plaintiff, against Chicago Railways Company, a corporation, and Ervin C. Hagerman, defendants, to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by being struck by an automobile owned by defendant Hagerman driven by his servant. From a judgment for defendants on an instructed verdict, plaintiff appeals.
    Charles C. Spencer and A. M. Griffin, for appellant.
    
      Abstract of the Decision.
    I. Automobiles and gabages, § 3
      
      —when verdict properly directed for defendant in action for personal injuries. In an action to recover damages for injuries sustained by being struck by an automobile alleged to be owned by the defendant, where the defendant pleaded specially that it did not own such automobile, held that the plaintiff’s failure to prove such ownership warranted a directed verdict for the defendant.
    2. Trial, § 195*—when direction of verdict is improper. On motion for a directed verdict against the plaintiff, the court looks to the evidence most favorable to the plaintiff’s claim, and if there is any evidence tending to support plaintiff’s claim the case is one for the jury and not for the court.
    Frank L. Kriete, for appellee Chicago Railways Company; W. W. Gurley, J. R. Guilliams and Philip Rosenthal, of counsel.
    H. L. Howard, for appellee Hagerman.
    
      
      See Illinois Notes Digest, Vols. XI to XV, and Cumulative Quarterly, same topic and section number.
    
   Mr. Justice Holdom

delivered the opinion of the court.