Case ID: ad_171/html/0456-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Jenks, P. J.:", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

John Rubel, Appellant, v. Central Railroad Company of New Jersey, Respondent.
    Second Department,
    January 14, 1916.
    Venue—action by non-resident against foreign corporation — change of venue to county in which defendant has its office and principal place of business.
    Where the venue in an action for negligence by a non-resident against a foreign corporation is laid in a county where the defendant did not maintain an office or transact any business or work its railroad, it is entitled to have the venue changed to the county where it has its office and principal place of business.
    Appeal by the plaintiff, John Rubel, from an order of the Supreme Court, made at the Westchester Special Term and entered in the office of the clerk of the county of Westchester on the 23d day of September, 1915, as resettled by two other orders entered in said clerk’s office on the 21st day of October,
    
      1915, and the 23d day of November, 1915, respectively, in so far as said orders grant defendant’s motion to change the place of trial herein.
    
      Sydney A. Syme, for the appellant.
    
      Robert Thorne, for the respondent.
   Jenks, P. J.:

The plaintiff sued the defendant in the county of Westchester for negligence. The defendant duly moved for a change of venue to the county of New York upon the ground that the latter was the proper county. It showed without dispute that it was a foreign corporation, with its office and principal place of business in New York city; that it did not maintain an office nor transact any business nor work its railroad in the county of Westchester, and that the plaintiff was a non-resident of this State. I think that the Special Term rightly granted the motion. In Finch School v. Finch (144 App. Div. 687) we held that upon such a motion a domestic corporation is deemed to be a resident of the county in which it has its principal office and place of business. And in Polley v. Lehigh Valley Railroad Co. (138 App. Div. 636; affd., 200 N. Y. 585) the court said that the reasoning that applies to domestic corporations as to matters of residence applies to foreign corporations. I think, therefore, that for the purposes of this motion, and upon this record, the residence of the defendant must be found in the county of New York. This decision does not conflict with Polley’s Case (supra), nor with Poland v. United Traction Co. (88 App. Div. 281; affd. on opinion below, 177 N. Y. 557), cited in Polley’s Case (supra). In Poland’s Case (supra) it was said that it seemed to be settled that in the case of a railroad corporation, its place of residence must be ascertained by its place of business; if it have several places of business, it must also be deemed to have several places of residence; and it was upon this principle that the court in those cases held that the railroad company, for the purposes of the venue, would be held resident of any county through which it worked its road. Subdivision 4 of section 1180- of the Code of Civil Procedure, added by chapter 60 of the Laws of 1913, makes obsolete our decision in Klunck v. Pennsylvania R. R. Co. (148 App. Div. 786).

I advise that the order be affirmed, with ten dollars costs and disbursements.

Thomas, Stapleton, Mills and Putnam, JJ., concurred. Order affirmed, with ten dollars costs and disbursements.