Case Name: Orrin Messenger vs. James Dennie
Court: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Jurisdiction: Massachusetts
Decision Date: 1884-05-10
Citations: 137 Mass. 197
Docket Number: 
Parties: Orrin Messenger vs. James Dennie.
Judges: 
Reporter: Massachusetts Reports
Volume: 137
Pages: 197–198

Head Matter:
Orrin Messenger vs. James Dennie.
Suffolk.
Jan. 14.
May 10, 1884.
C. Allen & Holmes, JJ., absent.
A boy eight years and nine months old, who, while engaged in the sport of riding upon the runners of sleighs in the public streets, with the consent of his parents, suddenly leaves a sleigh on which he is riding, while it is in motion, in a frequented thoroughfare, without looking behind him, and within thirty feet of a horse and sleigh following it, by which he is struck and injured, is guilty of such negligence as to preclude him from maintaining an action for the injury.
Tort, for personal injuries occasioned to the plaintiff, a boy eight years and nine months old, by being run over by the defendant’s horse and sleigh, on February 17, 1881, on Aspinwall Avenue in Brookline. At the trial in the Superior Court, before Pitman, J., the jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff; and the defendant alleged exceptions. The facts appear in the opinion.
C. F. Kittredge C. A. Williams, for the defendant.
R. P. Clapp, for the plaintiff.

Opinion:
W. Allen, J.
There was no evidence of due care on the part of the plaintiff. He voluntarily and thoughtlessly put himself in a position of great and obvious danger. He suddenly left the sleigh on which he was riding, while it was in motion, in a frequented thoroughfare, and within thirty feet of the defendant's horse, without looking back or thinking of what might be following. His injury was the natural consequence of his careless act. He was engaged in the sport of riding upon the runners of sleighs in the public streets with the consent of his parents; and, if he was too young to appreciate the danger of his act, he was too young to engage in that sport, and his parents were negligent in permitting it.
For this reason, without considering whether there was any evidence of negligence on the part of the defendant, the court should have ruled that the plaintiff could not recover.
Exceptions sustained.