Case ID: misc_67/html/0167-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "\n      Per Curiam:\n    ", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

John Gr. Meister, Respondent, v. William H. Woolverton, as President of the New York Transfer Company, Appellant.
    (Supreme Court, Appellate Term,
    March, 1910.)
    Carriers — Carriage of baggage and passenger’s effects — In general — Limitation of liability — Limitation by statute.
    New trial — Grounds — Verdict or findings contrary to law or evidence — Excessive damages.
    The provisions of section 38 of the Public Service Commissions Law (eh. 429, Laws 190-7), prescribing a limitation of $150 upon the amount recoverable for the loss of -baggage, is not applicable to a transfer company which transports the baggage only and not the passenger or owner.
    Where the jury in an action against a transfer company for loss of plaintiff’s baggage included in the verdict the sum of $200 which had no support in the evidence but was based solely upon plaintiff’s own estimate of value of certain jewelry, the value thereof being fixed by an expert jeweler approximately at $80, a judgment in plaintiff’s favor will be reversed and a new trial ordered, unless he stipulate to deduct $120 and interest, in which event judgment will be affirmed.
    Appeal by the defendant from a judgment of the City Court of the city of New York, entered in favor of the plaintiff after a trial before the court and a jury.
    Hill, Lockwood, Redfield & Lydon (Joseph E. Russell, of counsel), for -appellant.
    Holm, Whitlock & Scarff (Victor E. Whitlock, of counsel), for respondent.
   Per Curiam:

Upon the main question between the parties, the construction of section 38 of the Public Service Commissions Law, we concur in the reasoning of the Appellate Division of the Second Department in Morgan v. Woolverton, 136 App. Div. 351, and shall hereafter follow it in preference to Richardson v. Woolverton, 117 N. Y. Supp. 908, where the point as to the meaning of the word haggage” was not brought before the court. The testimony of the expert dressmaker as to the value of the dresses lost was not based on sufficiently definite information to malee it valuable, hut its admission was not reversible error. The jury took the plaintiff’s own much lower figures, which represented the actual cost of the dresses to his assignor. The testimony of the expert jeweler was competent, and fixed the value of the jewelry approximately at $80. The jury gave the plaintiff his own estimate of $200, which had no support in the evidence. This was evidently due to oversight.

1The judgment should he reversed 'and a new trial ordered, with costs to abide the event, unless plaintiff stipulates to reduce the amount by deducting $120 and interest to date of verdict, in which case it should he affirmed, without costs.

Present: Seabury, Guy and Whitney, JJ.

Judgment reversed and new trial ordered, with costs to abide event, unless plaintiff stipulates to reduce amount by deducting $120 and interest to date of verdict, in which case judgment affirmed, without costs.