Opinion ID: 1708271
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Propriety Of A J.N.O.V.

Text: In the instant case, the Plaintiffs attempted to show the railroad did not exercise reasonable care in three ways: (1) the railroad employees should have seen the deceased at some distance before they actually did; (2) that the employees failed to use their whistle once they did see the boy; and (3) that they did not use all of their available braking power. The first issue is of little consequence as a railroad is under no duty to keep a lookout for trespassers. See Hollingshead, 236 So.2d at 395; Fayard v. Louisville & N.R. Co., 48 So.2d 133, 136 (Miss 1950); Lee, 148 Miss. at 821, 114 So. at 869; and Dickerson v. Illinois Central Railroad Co., 244 Miss. 733, 748, 145 So.2d 913, 919 (1962). The third issue, breaking power, contains no factual dispute. The engineer, Brumfield, testified without contradiction that he applied the emergency brakes, without doubt a reasonable response under the circumstances. See Gulf, Mobile & Ohio Railroad Co. v. Hollingshead, 236 So.2d 393, 396 (Miss. 1970). Plaintiffs also fail credibly to suggest that the Railroad may have been tardy in applying the brakes. Our question thus boils down to whether there was sufficient evidence whereupon a rational jury may have found the Railroad breached its duty to sound the whistle once Keith Long was spotted on the tracks ahead. We find as a matter of law on these facts that the Railroad had enough time to sound the whistle. The testimony varies but suggests that Keith was seen between five and ten seconds before impact. This, coupled with the fact that both the engineer and fireman insist that the whistle was sounded, establishes that there was enough time. We have reviewed the testimony on this point with great care. First there is the positive evidence of the fireman and the engineer that the engineer blew the whistle in short blasts from the time the boy was spotted until the collision occurred. However, neither heard the blasts. Both, as well as three other railroad employees on the train that day testified that they never heard whistles while working inside the train with the doors closed. This testimony the Plaintiffs attempted to discredit by having an impartial party ride the Amtrak from Hazlehurst to McComb and record every whistle he heard along the way. Tim McNulty testified he heard the whistle blow fourteen times while he rode in various passenger cars. For this he was given only his ticket. Harold Carey Graves testified that he rode Amtrak on July 11, 1985, from Brookhaven to Winona and remembered hearing the whistle blown. He also remembered hearing a whistle on a trip from Brookhaven to New Orleans on Labor Day, 1983. Randy Donald Nations testified that he lives about three-quarters of a mile to a mile from where the accident occurred and that the day of the accident he had seen Keith Long putting air in his tires at a store across the street from Nations' house. Nations stated he was outside that afternoon and he never heard a whistle. Keith's stepfather was also outside in his yard at the time of the accident and did not hear a whistle. He stated that their house was about three miles from the site. James Ray Maxwell testified that he was in the area hunting at the time of the accident. Between 2:00 and 2:30 that afternoon he parked his truck a few feet from the track. It is difficult to ascertain Maxwell's position at the time of the accident, but he appears to have been north of the site some 150 yards from the tracks. He testified that after hearing the accident it took him five to ten minutes to get to the track and another five to ten minutes to walk down the track to get 150 to 200 yards from the stopped train. Maxwell testified that while he had heard the train coming for about 35 minutes, (I mean I got good ears) and had heard a bunch of air, he never heard a whistle blow. Maxwell also admitted he had been in Whitfield twice for high temper, and testified that his father, Curtis Maxwell, had married the decedent's mother sometime subsequent to the accident. Conflicting evidence as to whether a train whistle blew has been dealt with in more than a few cases. In Mobile & O.R. Co. v. Johnson, 157 Miss. 266, 126 So. 827 (1930) this Court stated: Negative testimony rises or declines in the scale of probative weight according to the opportunity of the negative witnesses to hear and observe; whether their attention was directed to or diverted from the fact in issue; whether the particular fact was an unusual or only a common occurrence in the daily routine of their lives; whether the particular witness was normal in the sense of hearing and sight; and whether observant or indifferent to details. 157 Miss. at 271, 126 So. at 828. These considerations are most often left to the jury, the Court continued, but the court may be required to apply the rule that The testimony of witnesses that they did not hear the ringing of the bell on a locomotive as it approached a crossing, without proof that the witnesses listened for the bell, or that their attention was any way directed to it, or that they probably must have heard the bell if it did ring, cannot prevail against the positive testimony of other credible witnesses that the bell did ring at the time in question. Johnson, 157 Miss. at 271, 126 So. at 828. See also Illinois Central Gulf Railroad Co. v. Yates, 334 So.2d 364, 368 (Miss. 1976); Gulf, Mobile & Ohio Railroad Co. v. Grubbs, 260 So.2d 837, 838 (Miss. 1972); and Illinois Central Railroad Co. v. Smith, 243 Miss. 766, 773-74, 140 So.2d 856, 857 (1962). In today's case the greater weight of the credible evidence supports the view that the emergency whistle was sounded. On the other hand, the firmly established rule respecting the authority of courts to intervene when a jury has resolved a question of fact preclude us acting upon that view. Considering the evidence in the light most favorable to the Plaintiffs, and giving the Plaintiffs the benefit of all favorable inferences that may reasonably be drawn therefrom, and taking the evidence on the issue of the sounding of the whistle in the aggregate, we may not escape the conclusion that there is in this record some credible evidence that the whistle never sounded. It follows that the Circuit Court erred when it granted judgment for the Railroad notwithstanding the verdict of the jury.